Journeying Into Mystery

INTRODUCTION

As Putin and the Russian military begin their version of “Shock and Awe” in their immoral invasion and the war they are waging in the nation of Ukraine, I remember vividly the night the George W Bush, Dick Cheney, and Donald Rumsfeld began their own immoral waging of war of “Shock and Awe” against the citizens of Iraq. Pope John Paul II several days before the anticipated attack condemned the United States invasion of Iraq as immoral act of war and concluded his remarks with the words, “WAR IS ALWAYS A DEFEAT FOR HUMANITY.” John Paul II having lived through not only the Nazi invasion and occupation of Poland, but also the invasion and occupation of Poland by the USSR, knew by experience the complete evil of war.

The Christian Church, since the time of the Emperor Constantine has tried to justify the horrific violence of war and at the same time tried to control the brutality of war in fabricating the “Just War Theory,” something I believe is a betrayal of the core teachings of Jesus. The Just War Theory has been used and abused to justify some of the worse of atrocities perpetuated by one segment of human society against another segment of human society. Pope’s have continued to fall back upon the Just War Theory to try to prevent war, to govern war, and protect the destruction to society by war, but have failed utterly failed. Finally, in his encyclical, Fratelli Tutti, Pope Francis 1, is ready to pull the plug on this most impotent attempt to govern the worse of human behavior.

The intent of this essay is that as another horrific war being waged by the authoritarian state, Russia, against Ukraine, a fledging democracy, is it finally time to call the Just War Theory not only a failed teaching of Christendom, but a false teaching of the Christian Church. Has the time to call ALL war a sin against humanity, and that it is time to return to the official teaching of the early Christian Church to condemn ALL KILLING, even when it is done to defend oneself?

Here it the Outline of this Essay:

1. What are the condition placed on a war being “just.”
2. The application of the Just War Theory to the History of Wars in the United States.
3. Wars that were just
4. Wars that were immoral
5. The United States Most Recent Immoral War
6. History and background to the war.
7. The overall cost in life, money, and environment because of the war
8. AP summary
9. The Watson Institute of International and Public Affairs Study of the costs of the War in Afghanistan and Iraq
10. The teachings of Jesus on War and Violence
11. The teachings of the early Church on War and Violence
12. The Roman Emperor Constantine and the Development of the Just War Theory
13. War and Nonviolence
14. Francis of Assisi
15. Mahatma Gandhi
16. Thomas Merton
17. Dr Martin Luther King Jr
18. The End of the Just War Theory and a Return to the Teachings of Jesus
19. Pope Francis I: Fratelli Tutti
20. Conclusion: There is no just war. All war is evil.

AN IMPORTANT CAVEAT TO KEEP IN MIND AS YOU READ THIS ESSAY.

Just because a war is immoral, and those who ordered a war to be fought may be immoral, it is important that those who are coerced to fight in those wars are not immoral, unless they commit a crime of war. Note: massacres are crimes of war that have happened in ALL nations during times of war and committed by ALL nations at one time or another in their history. A small list of massacres within the past 150 years include: 1) the Wounded Knee Massacre (General George Armstrong Custer and US Calvary against the Dakota Tribes in the American Indian War); 2) Medvedev Forest Massacre (Stalin ordered the NKVD to take a number of political prisoners held at Oryol Prison into Medvedev Forest and shoot them.); 3) the Babi Yar Massacre Ukraine (Nazi Einsatzgruppen killed the Jewish population of Kyiv); 4) Laha massacre (The Japanese killed surrendered Australian soldiers.); 5) Szczurowa massacre, Poland (Romani people were rounded up and murdered in the village cemetery by Nazi occupiers.); 6) Tantura massacre Palestine ( The Israel Defense Force’s Alexandroni Brigade attacked the village of Tantura and massacred up to 200 of its Palestinian Arab inhabitants.); 7) Liborista massacre Dominican Republic (The Dominican military dropped napalm on the Liboristas from airplanes—burning six hundred people to death.); 8)  Massacre at Huế  Vietnam ( During the 1968 Tet Offensive in the Vietnam War, unarmed South Vietnamese civilians were massacred by North Vietnamese Army and Vietcong. Numerous mass graves were discovered in and around Huế after the Offensive. Victims included women, men, children, and infants. Estimated death toll was between 2,800 and 6,000 civilians and POWs); 9) My Lai Massacre Vietnam (U.S. soldiers murdered, tortured and assaulted 347–504 unarmed South Vietnamese villagers suspected of aiding the Vietcong, ranging in ages from 1–81 years, mostly women and children); 10)  Kent State massacre, United States (29 members of the Ohio National Guard opened fire on unarmed students protesting the expansion of the Vietnam War into Cambodia on the Kent State University college campus, killing 4 and wounding 9, one of whom was permanently paralyzed.).

WHAT ARE THE CONDITIONS PLACED ON A WAR BEING “JUST”

While I will say more about what Jesus taught about war, and how the Just War Theory was developed, I would first like to list the conditions the Christian Church believe formulate a “just reason” to kill others in war. They are:

1. The war must be for a just cause.
2. The war must be lawfully declared by a lawful authority.
3. The intention behind the war must be good.
4. All other ways of resolving the problem should have been tried first.
5. There must be a reasonable chance of success.
6. The means used must be in proportion to the end that the war seeks to achieve.

THE APPLICATION OF THE JUST WAR THEORY TO THE HISTORY OF WAR IN THE UNITED STATES

How many of the wars, in which the United States has participated, been “Just Wars”.

Using the criteria above, here is the list, I believe, comprise what might be labeled “Just” in light of the Just War Theory.

1. American Revolution (fighting for the rights of Colonial citizens)
2. War of 1812 (a war fought to defend the United States against an invading Great Britain)
3. The Civil War (at least, on the side of the Union Army, which fought to defend the union of the United States against a Confederate aggressor)
4. World War I (a war in tnawhich the United States entered late, 1917, after German submarine warfare sank United States passenger ships and commercial shipping)
5. World War II (a war in which the United States was attacked by Japan and by the Axis powers of Germany and Italy)
6. The Korean War (initiated by the Stalinist USSR as a way of spreading the Russian Soviet influence in Asia, specifically the Korean peninsula).
7. The Gulf War (a war of a coalition of 35 nations, including the United States, against the nation of Iraq, when Iraq invaded its neighbor Kuwait, arising from oil pricing and production disputes.

Here is the list of wars in which the United States engaged that do NOT pass the criteria of a “Just War”, but were immoral and illegal wars.

1. The Mexican-American War (initiated by the United States to take territory from the sovereign nation of Mexico)
2. The Civil  War (which the Confederate or Southern Slave States of American sought to secede from the United States by declaring war on the Northern States and attacking U.S. military fort, Fort Sumter which led to the Northern or Union States to declare war in defense of the Union)
3. The American Indian War (in which the United States engaged in war and genocide against the Native American Tribes of America).
4. The Spanish American War (a war perpetuated by the United States upon Spain to annex the Spanish colonies of Puerto Rico, Guam, and the Philippine Islands, and temporary control of the nation of Cuba).
5. The Vietnam War (the history as to why the United States entered this war is complicated. The bottom line was that the will of the Vietnam people to keep their nation united, even under the Communist rule of Ho Chi Minh was preferable to the splitting of the nation into two parts: North Vietnam under Ho Chi Minh, and South Vietnam, under the corrupt regime of the Diem family.)
6. The War of Afghanistan and Iraq

THE UNITED STATES MOST RECENT IMMORAL WAR: THE WAR OF AFGHANISTAN AND IRAQ

I remember watching the rocket fire attack upon Baghdad, purportedly against “military targets”, knowing full well that in spite of the American military’s lauding of “smart bombs” and “smart rockets”, the bottom line is that they are neither smart nor are they inconsequential to the innocent human lives eviscerated and vaporized when they strike a civilian population. I went to bed anxious and nauseated because I knew that the invasion of Iraq was based on the lies of George W Bush, Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, and General Colin Power. I also knew that this war which the United States initiated would be this century’s Vietnam for the United States. While this is my personal bias, I believe anyone with a semblance of intelligence knew that Bush and Cheney, both who were wealthy because of Big Oil, were eager to go to war, not just to get even with Saddam Hussein and end Middle East terrorism, but were greedily eyeing the vast oil reserves of Iraq and coveting those oil reserves for the wealth it could bring them. To accomplish this, Bush, Cheney, and Rumsfeld invented the lie of Iraq manufacturing weapons of mass destruction. To get Congress and the world to buy this lie, they seduced General Colin Powell, Bush’s Secretary of State, to publicly lie for them to the United Nations and to Congress. The lie that Powell told weighed on his conscience so much so that prior to his death, Powell confessed that his one great sin, the one he regretted the most during his life was the Bush’s, Cheney’s, and Rumsfeld’s lie that he told to Congress and to the world.

At the time that Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, and Powell were sounding their war drums, I told my Dad that just as the mighty American military with all its tanks, planes, bombs, and heavy artillery were destroyed and defeated in Vietnam by, in comparison, lightly armed Viet Cong, so will the mighty American military be destroyed and defeated by similarly armed Taliban warriors dressed in flowing robes and turbans. The lies upon which the Vietnam War was built and the immorality of the war split the Unites States in two. The same would happen to the United States with Bush and Cheney’s wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. I wished I would be wrong, but as time has proven, I was correct.

We might wish to justify the past 20 year war in Afghanistan and Iraq as a moral good based on the terrorist attack on the World Trade Center in New York City and the Pentagon, and attempted attack on the White House (thwarted by passengers on the airplane). However, we have to ask exactly what moral good was accomplished by the invasion and occupation of Afghanistan and Iraq?

The initial reason given for the invasion of Afghanistan was to shut down the terrorist camps that trained and produced the men who flew the planes into the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, and, to assassinate Bin Laden the head of the terrorist organization, al-Qaeda. Bush quickly lost interest in going after Bin Laden and assassinating him. It would take another 10 years after 9/11, and under President Obama to finally find Bin Laden and kill him. Had we limited our military action to just those two reasons, we might have passed the Just War Theory. However, that was not enough.

The plans of Bush, Cheney, and Rumsfeld did not consider that Afghanistan is not really a nation but is largely multiple layers made up of ethnic, tribal, clan, family, or qawm entities. As much has these entities fight with one another, they all participated in the common purpose of destroying any nation that seeks to occupy their land. The land of Afghanistan is the death place of those mighty colonial powers who sought to colonize and occupy the land with its armies, including Great Britain, the USSR and, now, the United States. The torn bodies of their war dead litter the land of Afghanistan and are a sign that Afghanistan will be NOT conquered by ANY outside power.

WHAT GOOD HAS COME FROM 20 YEARS OF WAR IN AFGHANISTAN AND ITS COSTS

As the old adage states, “The proof is in the pudding.” In the end, what good has come out of 20 years of intense fighting? Are the lives of the Afghanistan people any better after all these wars? No. Once the occupiers leave in utter defeat, Afghanistan society sinks back into the mire it was prior to invasion.

Did the invasion and occupation of Afghanistan and Iraq make the Middle East more stabilized? Absolutely not! Terrorism has only grown more intense and more vicious than ever. The rise of the ISIS military state that has brutally destroyed so many human lives continues even though at the present, it is not as active. Iran, as a nation, has only grown more dangerous. Arab nations are at war internally and many are autocratic dictatorships, e.g. Turkey. Much of this horror can be placed directly on the shoulders of Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld and all the other chicken hawks in their administration and Congress.

As if all of the above was not enough, the greatest moral evil of this war is Bush and Cheney reintroducing torture as an acceptable tool to extract information from uncooperative prisoners even though torture has been proved to be one of the least effectual ways by which to get accurate information.

That war that Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld manufactured has destabilized the United States (see the rise of white supremacy and militarism in domestic terrorist groups like the Proud Boys and Oath Keepers), and the loss of human life and the financial well-being of the United States.

In an article by Ellen Knickmeyer of the Associated Press, August 16, 2021, the number of military lives lost in Afghanistan are:

1. American service members killed in Afghanistan through April: 2,448.
2. U.S. contractors: 3,846.
3. Afghan national military and police: 66,000.
4. Other allied service members, including from other NATO member states: 1,144.
5. Afghan civilians: 47,245.
6. Taliban and other opposition fighters: 51,191.
7. Aid workers: 444.
8. Journalists: 72.

The costs in dollars, all of it borrowed by the United States, in waging 20 years of war in Afghanistan and Iraq, is 2 trillion dollars. The estimated interest costs by 2050 will be up to 6.5 trillion dollars.

The Watson Institute of International and Public Affairs from Brown University has the following cost of 20 years of war in Afghanistan and Iraq.

1. At least 929,000 people have died due to direct war violence, including armed forces on all sides of the conflicts, contractors, civilians, journalists, and humanitarian workers. 
2. Over 387,000 civilians have been killed as a result of the fighting.
3. Many times more have died indirectly in these wars, due to ripple effects like malnutrition, damaged infrastructure, and environmental degradation.
4. Over 7,050 U.S. soldiers have died in the wars.
5. Official Pentagon numbers do not include the many troops who return home and kill themselves as a result of psychological wounds such as PTSD. Over 30,177 service members and veterans of the post-9/11 wars have committed suicide — over four times as many as have died in combat.
6. We do not know the full extent of how many US service members returning from these wars became injured or ill while deployed.
7. 38 million — the number of war refugees and displaced persons.
8. The US federal price tag for the post-9/11 wars is over $8 trillion. The human and economic costs of these wars will continue for decades with some costs, such as the financial costs of US veterans’ care, not peaking until mid-century.
9. The US government is conducting counterterror activities in 85 countries.
10. The wars have been accompanied by violations of human rights and civil liberties, in the U.S. and abroad.
11. Most US government funding of reconstruction efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan has gone towards arming security forces in both countries. Much of the money allocated to humanitarian relief and rebuilding civil society has been lost to fraud, waste, and abuse.
12. The post-9/11 wars have contributed significantly to climate change. The Defense Department is one of the world’s top greenhouse gas emitters.

In just a reading through the horrific cost in life, in money, and the destruction that it caused society not only in Afghanistan, Iraq, and the Middle East, but in the United States, one is easily overwhelmed to the point of the sheer lunacy of it all. It brought me back to the Edwin Starr song from the 60’s, “War.”

I said, war, huh (good God, y’all)
What is it good for?
Absolutely nothing, just say it again
What is it good for?
Absolutely nothing, listen to me

It ain’t nothing but a heart-breaker
(War) Friend only to The Undertaker
Oh, war it’s an enemy to all mankind
The thought of war blows my mind
War has caused unrest
Within the younger generation
Induction then destruction
Who wants to die? Oh

Refrain

It ain’t nothing but a heart-breaker
(War) It’s got one friend that’s The Undertaker
Oh, war, has shattered many a young man’s dreams
Made him disabled, bitter and mean
Life is much too short and precious
To spend fighting wars each day
War can’t give life
It can only take it away, oh

Refrain

It ain’t nothing but a heart breaker
(War) Friend only to The Undertaker, woo
Peace, love and understanding, tell me
Is there no place for them today?
They say we must fight to keep our freedom
But Lord knows there’s got to be a better way, oh

Refrain

“War”, Songwriters: Barrett Strong / Norman Whitfield
War lyrics © Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC

THE TEACHING OF JESUS ABOUT WAR

In contrast to the image of God as a warrior God found in the Hebrew Testament, the image of God that Jesus teaches is a God of love and compassion, Jesus being the human incarnation of the Divine God. Jesus acknowledged the existence of war and the destruction that war causes in human society, however, Jesus never advocated war. Jesus instead advocates love and nonviolence as the new order of humanity.

When he saw the crowds, he went up the mountain, and after he had sat down, his disciples came to him. He began to teach them, saying: “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are they who mourn, for they will be comforted. Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the land. Blessed are they who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be satisfied. Blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy. Blessed are the clean of heart, for they will see God. Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God. Blessed are they who are persecuted for the sake of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are you when they insult you and persecute you and utter every kind of evil against you [falsely] because of me. Rejoice and be glad, for your reward will be great in heaven. Thus they persecuted the prophets who were before you. (Matthew 5:1-12, NAB)

This is supported by the account of Jesus’ arrest in Matthew’s Passion. “Then stepping forward they laid hands on Jesus and arrested him. And behold, one of those who accompanied Jesus put his hand to his sword, drew it, and struck the high priest’s servant, cutting off his ear. Then Jesus said to him, “Put your sword back into its sheath, for all who take the sword will perish by the sword. Do you think that I cannot call upon my Father and he will not provide me at this moment with more than twelve legions of angels? But then how would the scriptures be fulfilled which say that it must come to pass in this way?” (Matthew 26: 50b-54, NAB).

Jesus said in Luke’s Gospel, “But to you who hear I say, love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you. To the person who strikes you on one cheek, offer the other one as well, and from the person who takes your cloak, do not withhold even your tunic. Give to everyone who asks of you, and from the one who takes what is yours do not demand it back. Do to others as you would have them do to you. For if you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? Even sinners love those who love them. And if you do good to those who do good to you, what credit is that to you? Even sinners do the same. If you lend money to those from whom you expect repayment, what credit [is] that to you? Even sinners lend to sinners, and get back the same amount. But rather, love your enemies and do good to them, and lend expecting nothing back; then your reward will be great and you will be children of the Most High, for he himself is kind to the ungrateful and the wicked. Be merciful, just as [also] your Father is merciful. (Luke 6:27-36, NAB)

The National Conference of Catholic Bishops (the former organization of United States Catholic Bishops) in their prophetic 1983 pastoral letter, The Challenge of Peace: God’s Promise and Our Response, outlined the following summation of Jesus’ teaching on the Reign of God (see The Challenge of Peace, in b. Jesus and the Reign of God):

1. Jesus proclaimed the reign of God in his words and made it present in his actions. His words begin with a call to conversion and a proclamation of the arrival of the kingdom. (#44)
2. His words, especially as they are preserved for us in the Sermon on the Mount, describe a new reality in which God’s power is manifested and the longing of the people is fulfilled. In God’s reign the poor are given the kingdom, the mourners are comforted, the meek inherit the earth, those hungry for righteousness are satisfied, the merciful know mercy, the pure see God, the persecuted know the kingdom, and peacemakers are called the children of God. (#45)
3. Jesus’ words also depict for us the conduct of one who lives under God’s reign. His words call for a new way of life which fulfills and goes beyond the law. One of the most striking characteristics of this new way is forgiveness. All who hear Jesus are repeatedly called to forgive one another, and to do so not just once, but many, many times. The forgiveness of God, which is the beginning of salvation, is manifested in communal forgiveness and mercy. (#46)
4. Jesus also described God’s reign as one in which love is an active, life-giving, inclusive force. He called for a love which went beyond family ties and bonds of friendship to reach even those who were enemies. Such a love does not seek revenge but rather is merciful in the face of threat and opposition. Disciples are to love one another as Jesus has loved them. (#47)
5. The words of Jesus would remain an impossible, abstract ideal were it not for two things: the actions of Jesus and his gift of the spirit. In his actions, Jesus showed the way of living in God’s reign; he manifested the forgiveness which he called for when he accepted all who came to him, forgave their sins, healed them, released them from the demons who possessed them. In doing these things, he made the tender mercy of God present in a world which knew violence, oppression, and injustice. Jesus pointed out the injustices of his time and opposed those who laid burdens upon the people or defiled true worship. He acted aggressively and dramatically at times, as when he cleansed the temple of those who had made God’s house into a “den of robbers” (#48)
6. Most characteristic of Jesus’ actions are those in which he showed his love. As he had commanded others, his love led him even to the giving of his own life to effect redemption. Jesus’ message and his actions were dangerous ones in his time, and they led to his death – a cruel and viciously inflicted death, a criminal’s death (Gal. 3:13). In all of his suffering, as in all of his life and ministry, Jesus refused to defend himself with force or with violence. He endured violence and cruelty so that God’s love might be fully manifest and the world might be reconciled to the One from whom it had become estranged. Even at his death, Jesus cried out for forgiveness for those who were his executioners: “Father, forgive them . . .” (#49)
7. The resurrection of Jesus is the sign to the world that God indeed does reign, does give life in death, and that the love of God is stronger even than death. (#50)
8. Only in light of this, the fullest demonstration of the power of God’s reign, can Jesus’ gift of peace – a peace which the world cannot give be understood. The peace which he gives to them as he greets them as their risen Lord is the fullness of salvation. It is the reconciliation of the world and God; the restoration of the unity and harmony of all creation which the Old Testament spoke of with such longing. Because the walls of hostility between God and humankind were broken down in the life and death of the true, perfect servant, union and well-being between God and the world were finally fully possible (#51)
9. Jesus Christ, then, is our peace, and in his death-resurrection he gives God’s peace to our world. In him God has indeed reconciled the world, made it one, and has manifested definitely that his will is this reconciliation, this unity between God and all peoples, and among the peoples themselves. The way to union has been opened, the covenant of peace established. The risen Lord’s gift of peace is inextricably bound to the call to follow Jesus and to continue the proclamation of God’s reign. (#54)

THE EARLY CHRISTIAN CHURCH UP TO THE TIME OF CONSTANTINE

The early Christian Church took the words of Jesus to heart, believed his teachings and lived his teachings. In the early Christian Church, a Christian was forbidden to join any army. There were three criteria that would remove a Christian from the Christian community: 1) Murder, 2) Adultery, and, 3) Apostasy (denying the Christian faith). Murder, the killing of another human, is forbidden in the Ten Commandments (see Exodus) of the Hebrew Scriptures. And, as we read above in the passage from Luke’s Gospel, Jesus also forbids the taking of human life, even the life of an enemy. This is also echoed throughout the rest of the Gospels. Up to 312 AD, the teaching was very clear for Christians, KILLING IS ALWAYS WRONG. The most profound theological reason for this prohibition was the cross of Jesus. The execution of Jesus is the standard by which all Christians must live, that is, to love, not kill their enemies.

SO WHAT HAPPENED? THE JUST WAR THEORY

Plain and simple, the Christian Church got corrupted by the Emperor Constantine, when he made the Christian Church the religion of the Roman Empire. Basically, Constantine substituted all the symbols and worship of the god of war, namely, Mars, for that of Jesus. The Chi-Ro, the symbol of Christ was then emblazoned on the war shields of the Roman Imperial army. Within a hundred years, only Christians could be soldiers of the Roman Imperial army. At that time, with so many Christians now fighting in the Roman Imperial armed forces, Imperial Rome appealed to the Christian bishops, Ambrose and Augustine (Hippo), for a justification for war. And so, the Gospel of Jesus began to become watered down to allow the brutality of human war under the guise of a theology on a “Just War.” Later, the Christian theologian Thomas Acquinas combined the thoughts of pagan philosophers, e.g. Socrates and Aristotle with the theology developed by Ambrose and Augustine. (see above)

It was the use of the Just War Theology by which Pope John Paul II condemned the American invasion of Iraq. John Paul II argued that while the invasion was lawfully declared by a lawful authority, all the other criteria of the Just War Theology was NOT met. Perhaps, based on the immoral reason for the waging of war in Iraq, we should not be surprised that from that war emerge such terrorist organizations as ISIS, which is al-Qaeda on steroids. Perhaps we should not be surprised at the great destruction of not only human life, but the destruction of the human spirit of those who were involved in combat in that war. In many ways, evil only begets evil.

WAR AND NONVIOLENCE

Aside from the Gospels of Jesus in the Christian Testament and the early teachings of the Church Fathers up to the Emperor Constantine, there are relatively few Christians, with the exception of Francis of Assisi, and centuries later, Thomas Merton, Dr Martin Luther King Jr, and Archbishop Desmond Tuttu, who taught Christian non-violence.

Francis of Assisi

While there have been numerous biographies written about Francis of Assisi, some by his contemporaries, e.g. Thomas of Celano and Bonaventure, Francis’ actual writings are limited to his religious rule of life, prayer, some letters, and how his followers are meant to live out their religious vocations as those following the principles of his way of spirituality. There are prayers attributed to Francis of Assisi that he did not write, e.g. The Prayer of St Francis, but sum up the way he lived his life.

What we know of Francis of Assisi from all the biographies of him, is that he was the son of a rich textile merchant, born in 1181 A.D. As a young man, he was spoiled rich and lived fully a life of decadence. Like many adolescents of his time, he had romantic dreams of being a knight. Italy did not really exist as a nation at that time, and many of the feudal states that comprised Italy engaged in war with one another. Assisi went to war against neighboring Perugia, a war Assisi lost, and Francis spent a year as a military prisoner of Perugia. He returned to Assisi after a year, There is a story by his biographers that while riding his horse, dressed in fine armor, on his way to join the Christian Crusades, he encountered a leper beggar along the road. He dismounted from his horse and embraced and kissed the leper and gave the leper his horse and armor. His life began to change following that encounter. Francis would later wander into the ruined chapel of San Damiano and while gazing on the icon of Jesus on the crucifix, hear Jesus speak to him from that crucifix. What Francis heard from the figure of Jesus was to “repair his Church which had fallen into ruin.” Francis’ life underwent many great changes as he began to understand that the Church he was to repair was not the ruined chapel into which he had wandered, but he was to enact a reform of the Christian Church which was being ruined by opulence and corruption.

Francis of Assisi, in seeing the presence of God in all living creatures, in all of the elements, and, especially in humanity, lived a life of nonviolence. He was known to pick up earthworms from the road pavement to prevent them from being crushed under the hooves of horses traveling on the road.

In 1219, he traveled with the Fifth Crusade into Palestine, not with the intention of supporting the violence of the Crusade, but with the intent of converting the Sultan of Egypt to Christianity, or to die a martyr’s death in that attempt. Along the way, he knew by the rape, killing, and pillaging inflicted by the Crusaders upon the places they went, the Crusade was going to fail miserably. Francis left the safe lines of the Crusaders and walked into the midst of the Muslim army. He got his chance to address the Sultan and tried to convert him. The Sultan declined to convert to Christianity, but admired the bravery and the integrity of Francis. He gave Francis permission to visit unharmed all the Holy Places of Jesus in Palestine. Francis returned to Europe via Acre.

Pope Francis I in his introduction to the encyclical, “Fratelli Tutti” summarizes the impact of Francis of Assisi’s teaching and way of life so succinctly.

1. “FRATELLI TUTTI”.[1] With these words, Saint Francis of Assisi addressed his brothers and sisters and proposed to them a way of life marked by the flavour of the Gospel. Of the counsels Francis offered, I would like to select the one in which he calls for a love that transcends the barriers of geography and distance, and declares blessed all those who love their brother “as much when he is far away from him as when he is with him”.[2] In his simple and direct way, Saint Francis expressed the essence of a fraternal openness that allows us to acknowledge, appreciate and love each person, regardless of physical proximity, regardless of where he or she was born or lives.

2. This saint of fraternal love, simplicity and joy, who inspired me to write the Encyclical Laudato Si’, prompts me once more to devote this new Encyclical to fraternity and social friendship. Francis felt himself a brother to the sun, the sea and the wind, yet he knew that he was even closer to those of his own flesh. Wherever he went, he sowed seeds of peace and walked alongside the poor, the abandoned, the infirm and the outcast, the least of his brothers and sisters.

3. There is an episode in the life of Saint Francis that shows his openness of heart, which knew no bounds and transcended differences of origin, nationality, color or religion. It was his visit to Sultan Malik-el-Kamil, in Egypt, which entailed considerable hardship, given Francis’ poverty, his scarce resources, the great distances to be traveled and their differences of language, culture and religion. That journey, undertaken at the time of the Crusades, further demonstrated the breadth and grandeur of his love, which sought to embrace everyone. Francis’ fidelity to his Lord was commensurate with his love for his brothers and sisters. Unconcerned for the hardships and dangers involved, Francis went to meet the Sultan with the same attitude that he instilled in his disciples: if they found themselves “among the Saracens and other nonbelievers”, without renouncing their own identity they were not to “engage in arguments or disputes, but to be subject to every human creature for God’s sake”. In the context of the times, this was an extraordinary recommendation. We are impressed that some eight hundred years at“subjection” be shown to those who did not share his faith.

4. Francis did not wage a war of words aimed at imposing doctrines; he simply spread the love of God. He understood that “God is love and those who abide in love abide in God” (1 Jn 4:16). In this way, he became a father to all and inspired the vision of a fraternal society. Indeed, “only the man who approaches others, not to draw them into his own life, but to help them become ever more fully themselves, can truly be called a father”. In the world of that time, bristling with watchtowers and defensive walls, cities were a theatre of brutal wars between powerful families, even as poverty was spreading through the countryside. Yet there Francis was able to welcome true peace into his heart and free himself of the desire to wield power over others. He became one of the poor and sought to live in harmony with all. Francis has inspired these pages.

The desire of Francis was to live as closely as he could, the life of Jesus, as portrayed in the Gospels. “From Gospel to life, from life to Gospel” is the rule of the Franciscan Orders, or way of spirituality, that Francis left his followers. In that desire to live as Jesus did, Francis renounced the use of force and the use of arms against others.

Mahatma Gandhi

The greatest non-Christian teacher of nonviolence is Mahatma Gandhi who lived by the Hindu principle of Ahimsa, an ancient Indian principle of nonviolence which applies to all living beings.

Here are some of the teachings that Gandhi spoke on nonviolence. In reading what Gandhi wrote below that for Gandhi, nonviolence is not just a philosophical theory, but as he writes is “the rule and the breath of his life.” To live nonviolently in world in which the evil of war is constant requires the utmost heroism, knowing that it is far preferable to sacrifice oneself and die rather than to act violently toward another human being. Hatred is an empty and ultimately bankrupt reason for entering into conflict, for in the end, while hatred may destroy one’s enemy, it also destroys the self. Violence leads, in the words of Gandhi, to gangsterism, and demonstrates that humanity has not advanced much above that of the animals in the jungle. In acknowledging the destructive hate and violence in Hitler and Mussolini, Gandhi observes, “ultimately, force, however justifiably used, will lead us into the same morass as the force of Hitler and Mussolini. There will be just a difference of degree. You and I who believe in non-violence must use it at the critical moment. We may not despair of touching the hearts even of gangsters, even if, for the moment, we may seem to be striking our heads against a blind wall.” In the overall destruction of human society, Gandhi writes, “Like opium production, the world manufacture of swords needs to be restricted. The sword is probably responsible for more misery in the world than opium.”

1. For me non-violence is not a mere philosophical principle. It is the rule and the breath of my life. I know I fail often, sometimes consciously, more often unconsciously. It is a matter not of the intellect but of the heart. True guidance comes by the constant waiting upon God, by utmost humility, self-abnegation, by being ever ready to sacrifice one’s self. Its practice requires fearlessness and courage of the highest order. I am painfully aware of my failings.
2. But the light within me is steady and clear. There is no escape for any of us save through truth and non-violence. I know that war is wrong, is an unmitigated evil. I know too that it has got to go. I firmly believe that freedom won through bloodshed or fraud is no freedom… Not violence, not untruth, but non-violence, Truth is the law of our being. (YI, 13-9-1928, p. 308)
3. Hatred, cannot be turned into love. Those who believed in violence will naturally use it by saying, ” kill your enemy, injure him and his property wherever you can, whether openly or secretly as necessity requires.” The result will be deeper hatred and counter hatred and vengeance let loose on both sides. The recent war (reference to World War II), whose members have yet hardly died, loudly proclaims the bankruptcy of this use of hatred. And it remains to be seen whether the so-called victors have won or whether they have not depressed themselves in seeking and trying to depress their enemies.” (H, 24-2-1946, p. 20)
4. If the best minds of the world have not imbibed the spirit of non-violence, they would have to meet gangsterism in the orthodox way. But that would only show that we have not got far beyond the law of the jungle, that we have not yet learnt to appreciate the heritage that God has given us, that, in spite of the teaching of Christianity which is 1900 years old and of Hinduism and Buddhism which are older, and even of Islam (if I have read it aright), we have not made much headway as human beings. But, whilst I would understand the use of force by those who have not the spirit of non-violence to throw their whole weight in demonstrating that even gangsterism has to be met by non-violence. For, ultimately, force, however justifiably used, will lead us into the same morass as the force of Hitler and Mussolini. There will be just a difference of degree. You and I who believe in non-violence must use it at the critical moment. We may not despair of touching the hearts even of gangsters, even if, for the moment, we may seem to be striking our heads against a blind wall. (H, 10-12-1938, p. 372)
5. “How could a disarmed neutral country allow other nations to be destroyed? But for our army which was waiting ready at our frontier during the last war we should have been ruined.”At  the risk of being considered a visionary or a fool I must answer this question in the only manner I know. It would be cowardly of a neutral country to allow an army to devastate a neighbouring country. But there are two ways in common between soldiers of war and soldier of non-violence, and if I had been a citizen of Switzerland and President of the Federal State, what I would have done would be to refuse passage to the invading army by refusing all supplies. Secondly, by reenacting a Thermopylx in Switzerland, you would have presented a living wall of men and woman and children, inviting invaders to walk over your corpses. You may say that such a thing is beyond human experience and endurance. I say that it is not so. It was quite possible. Last year in Gujarat, women stood LATHI charges unflinchingly, and in Peshawar, thousands stood hails of bullets without resorting to violence. Imagine these men and women staying in front of an army requiring a safe passage to another country. The army would be brutal enough to walk over them, you might say. I would then say you will still have done your duty by allowing yourself to be annihilated. An army that dares to pass over the corpses of innocent men and women would not be able to repeat that experiment. You may, if you wish, refuse to believe in such courage on the part of the masses o men and women, but, then, you would have to admit that non-violence is made of sterner stuff. It was never conceived as a weapon of the weak but of the stoutest hearts. (YI, 31-12-1931, p. 427)
6. Like opium production, the world manufacture of swords needs to be restricted. The sword is probably responsible for more misery in the world than opium. (YI, 19-11-1925, p. 397)

In Christianity’s rejection of the non-violent teaching of Jesus, Mahatma Gandhi had much to say:

1. Live like Jesus did, and the world will listen.
2. “I like your Christ, I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ.”
3. It is a first class human tragedy that people of the earth who claim to believe in the message of Jesus, whom they describe as the Prince of Peace, show little of that belief in actual practice.
4. If all Christian acted like Christ, the whole world would be Christian.

Thomas Merton

Thomas Merton, a Trappist monk, was well educated, and one of the greatest thinkers of Catholicism in the 20^th century, was also one who took the teachings of Mahatma Gandhi on nonviolence very seriously. Thomas Merton studied the life and writings of Gandhi and analyzed them in light of Christianity and the teachings of Jesus in the Gospels. As Rasoul Sorkhabi wrote in his article, Thomas Merton’s Reflections on Mahatma Gandhi (Satyagraha Foundation for Nonviolence Studies, April 13, 2016, under Gandhi, Theory), “Merton quotes Gandhi as saying: “Jesus died in vain if he did not teach us to regulate the whole life by the eternal law of love.”

Rasoul Sorkhabi continues, “In “Gandhi: The Gentle Revolutionary” Merton remembers his first encounter with Gandhi in 1931 when Gandhi was visiting London as a representative of the Indian Congress to the Round Table Conference that the British government had convened to discuss the issue of India’s demands for independence. Merton was then a student at Oakham boarding school in Rutland, England. He was sympathetic to Gandhi’s ideals about a free India and recalls an argument he had with his school football coach who believed that Indians were primitive people and needed to be governed by the British Raj. Merton writes that “a dozen years after Gandhi’s visit to London there were more hideous barbarities perpetuated in Europe, with greater violence and more unmitigated fury than all that has ever been attributed by the wildest imaginations to the despots of Asia. The British Empire collapsed. India attained self-rule. It did so peacefully and with dignity. Gandhi paid with his life for the ideals in which he believed. … He singles out Gandhi “as a great leader, one of the noblest men of our century”, because he was truly and sincerely (not opportunistically or verbally) committed to peace politics. Gandhi objected to politics as a means to empower oneself and to humiliate or wipe out the other party in battle, and instead suggested svadharma (personal responsibility) as characterizing a political action based on a religious understanding of being, life, love and our place in the world. Merton quotes Gandhi: “If love is not the law of our being, the whole of my argument falls to pieces.” Merton refers to Gandhi’s concept of satyagraha (Truth Force) and defines it as “simply conforming one’s words to one’s inner thought.” Merton then explains that “our aims, our plans of actions, our outlook, our attitudes, our habitual response to the problems and challenges of life” more effectively than words speak of our inner being.”

In his essays and books, Merton wrote extensively about nonviolence and war, and how Christians MUST embrace the nonviolence and love of Christ if war is ever to be eliminated from the human condition. He writes that “Unless we set ourselves immediately to the task, both as individuals and in our political and religious groups, we tend by our passivity and fatalism to cooperate with the destructive forces that are leading inexorably to war. It is a problem of terrifying complexity and magnitude, for which the Church itself is not fully able to see clear and decisive solutions. Yet she must lead the road on the way toward nonviolent settlement of difficulties and toward the gradual abolition of war as the way of settling international or civil disputes.”

Merton refers that it was Christ who liberated human from the blood-drinking gods of war, “by the death of a God Who delivered Himself to the cross and suffered the pathological cruelty of His own creatures out of pity for them. In conquering death He opened their eyes to the reality of a love which asks no questions about worthiness, a love which overcomes hatred and destroys death.” However, Merton warns that humanity has once more “come to reject this divine revelation of pardons and they are consequently returning to the old war gods, the gods that insatiably drink blood and eat the flesh of men. It is easier to serve the hate-gods because they thrive on the worship of collective fanaticism.”

Merton also states the principle that the cartoonist, Walt Kelly, said so succinctly by his character, Pogo, in the comic strip “Pogo”, “We have met the enemy and is he us,” when Merton wrote, “Do not be quick to assume that your enemy is an enemy of God just because he is your enemy. Perhaps he is your enemy precisely because he can find nothing in you that gives glory to God. Perhaps he fears you because he can find nothing in you of God’s love, and God’s kindness, and God’s patience and mercy and understanding of the weakness of men.”

The last but not least invaluable insight has of what Christianity can bring to nonviolence is “precisely the advantage of nonviolence that it has a more “Christian and more humane notion of what is possible. Where the powerful believe that only power is efficacious, the nonviolent resister is persuaded by the efficacy of love, openness, peaceful negotiation, and above all of truth. For power can guarantee the interests of some men, but it can never foster the god of all man.”

Below are these thoughts in the words of Merton in their full context.

1. There can be no question that unless war is abolished the world will remain constantly in a state of madness and desperation in which because of the immense destructive power of modern weapons, the danger of catastrophe will remain imminent and probably at every moment everywhere. Unless we set ourselves immediately to the task, both as individuals and in our political and religious groups, we tend by our passivity and fatalism to cooperate with the destructive forces that are leading inexorably to war. It is a problem of terrifying complexity and magnitude, for which the Church itself is not fully able to see clear and decisive solutions. Yet she must lead the road on the way toward nonviolent settlement of difficulties and toward the gradual abolition of war as the way of settling international or civil disputes. Christians must become active in every possible way, mobilizing all their resources for the fight against war. First of all there is must to be studied, much to be learned. Peace is to be preached, nonviolence is to be explained as a practical method, and not left to be mocked as an outlet for crackpots who want to make a show for themselves. Prayers and sacrifice must be used as the most effective spiritual weapons in the war against war, and like all weapons they must be used with deliberate aim: not just as a vague aspiration for peace and security, but against violence and war. This also implies that we are also willing to sacrifice and restrain our own instinct for violence and aggressiveness in our relations with other people. We may never succeed in this campaign, but whether we succeed or not the duty is evident. It is the great Christian task of our time. Everything else is secondary, for the survival of the human race itself is depends on it. We must at least face this responsibility and do something about it. And the first job of all is to understand the psychological forces within ourselves and in society. (“The Root of War” I in the Catholic Worker 28, October 1961.)
2. Strong hate, the hate that takes joy in hating, is strong because it does not believe itself to be unworthy and alone. It feels the support of a justifying God, of an idol of war, and avenging and destroying spirit. From such blood-drinking gods the human race was once liberated, with great toil and terrible sorrow, by the death of a God Who delivered Himself to the cross and suffered the pathological cruelty of His own creatures out of pity for them. In conquering death He opened their eyes to the reality of a love which asks no questions about worthiness, a love which overcomes hatred and destroys death. But men have now come to reject this divine revelation of pardons and they are consequently returning to the old war gods, the gods that insatiably drink blood and eat the flesh of men. It is easier to serve the hate-gods because they thrive on the worship of collective fanaticism. To serve the hate-gods, one only has to be blinded by collective passion. To serve the God of Love one must be free, one must face the terrible responsibility of the decision to love in spite of all unworthiness whether in oneself or one’s neighbor. (New Seeds of Contemplation, 73-74, New York: New Direction, 1962)
3. Do not be too quick to assume your enemy is a savage just because he is your enemy. Perhaps he is your enemy because he thinks you are a savage. Or perhaps he is afraid of you because he feels you are afraid of him. And perhaps if he believed you were capable of loving him he would no longer be your enemy. Do not be quick to assume that your enemy is an enemy of God just because he is your enemy. Perhaps he is your enemy precisely because he can find nothing in you that gives glory to God. Perhaps he fears you because he can find nothing in you of God’s love, and God’s kindness, and God’s patience and mercy and understanding of the weakness of men. Do not be too quick to condemn the man who no longer believes in God, for it is perhaps your own coldness and avarice, your mediocrity and materialism, your sensuality and your selfishness that have killed his faith. (New Seeds of Contemplation, 77, New York: New Direction, 1962)
4. Instead of trying to use the adversary as leverage for one’s own effort to realize an ideal, nonviolence seeks only to enter into dialogue with him in order to attain, together with him, the common good of man. Nonviolence must be realistic and concrete. Like ordinary political action, it is no more than the “art of the possible.” But precisely the advantage of nonviolence that it has a more “Christian and more humane notion of what is possible. Where the powerful believe that only power is efficacious, the nonviolent resister is persuaded by the efficacy of love, openness, peaceful negotiation, and above all of truth. For power can guarantee the interests of some men, but it can never foster the god of all man. Power always protect the good of some at the expense of all the others. Only love can attain and preserve the good of all. Any claim to build the security of all on force is a manifest imposture. (Passion for Peace: The Social Essays, pp. 254, ed. William H. Shannon, New York: Crossroads, 1995)

 In an article entitiled, “Thomas Merton, the problem of war and the character of Christian non-violence”, Gregory Hillis, an associate professor of theology at Bellarmine University, writes:

“One of my favourite Merton books is Conjectures of a Guilty Bystander, published in 1965. It’s a unique book. It contains no narrative flow, but is rather a series of brief meditations on the world and the church. Merton holds nothing back in this book in his criticism of the dominant political climate of the 1960s and of the willingness of his fellow Roman Catholics to buy into a politics dominated by individualism and power. This Merton calls the “practical atheism” of many Christians who not only buy the dominant political culture, but who actually view power and coercion as the most appropriate and realistic approach to deal with adversaries.

“But Merton will have none of this. Throughout his writings, Merton emphasizes repeatedly that the genuine transformation of human society can never occur through violence. At best, violence begets hatred and more violence. At worst, in a nuclear age, violence results in the destruction of all life.

“Thomas Merton argues that Christ came to inaugurate a new way of being, a new Kingdom in which the predominant mode of doing politics in the world is rejected. Nonviolence is not to be rejected, as it so often is by Christians and non-Christians alike, as “phony and sentimental.” Rather, based as it is on a decidedly Christian understanding of humanity in light of the Incarnation, it is the only means of being political that can actually lead to genuine transformation, a transformation rooted in love. For, as Merton writes, “Love, love only, love of our deluded fellow man as he actually is … this alone can open to the door to truth.” Not only, therefore, is it “a style of politics for peace.” It is for Merton the only style of politics open to Christians.” (www.abc.net.au/religion/thomas-merton-the-problem-of-war-and-the-character-of-Christian-non-violence)

Dr Martin Luther King Jr

Much has been written by Dr Martin Luther King Jr, and about Dr Martin Luther King Jr. Dr Martin Luther King Jr, was a disciple of Mahatma Gandhi, and adapted Gandhi’s teachings on nonviolence to his own Christian ministry and his work for the civil right of Afro-Americans in the United States. While King focused the majority of his life and his words to nonviolent change, at times, he would address the subject of warfare.

In a documentary on his life, it was said, “King came to view U.S. intervention in Southeast Asia as little more than imperialism. Additionally, he believed that the Vietnam War diverted money and attention from domestic programs created to aid the Black poor. Furthermore, he said, “The war was doing far more than devastating the hopes of the poor at home…We were taking the Black young men who had been crippled by our society and sending them eight thousand miles away to guarantee liberties in Southeast Asia which they had not found in southwest Georgia and East Harlem.” Martin Luther King Jr. speaks out against the war https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/martin-luther-king-jr-speaks-out-against-the-war A&E Television Networks November 16, 2009

Other notable quotes of Dr Martin Luther King Jr on nonviolent change are:

1. “Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.” Bartleby research.
2. “We adopt the means of nonviolence because our end is a community at peace with itself.”
3. “Here is the true meaning and value of compassion and nonviolence, when it helps us to see the enemy’s point of view, to hear his questions, to know his assessment.”
4. “Nonviolence is a powerful and just weapon, which cuts without wounding and ennobles the man who wields it. It is a sword that heals.”
5. “Nonviolence is absolute commitment to the way of love. Love is not emotional bash; it is not empty sentimentalism.” Reference: borgenproject.org/martin-luther-kings-quotes-about-nonviolence/

THE END OF THE JUST WAR THEORY AND A RETURN TO THE TEACHINGS OF JESUS

It has become clear over the past 90 years, that those who have studied the teachings of Jesus are rejecting the Christian Church teachings on the Just War Theory. Whether it be Gandhi, Merton, the Catholic Bishops of the NCCB, and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr, the ability of humankind to destroy itself, and ALL LIFE on Earth, war is a moral evil that must end once and for all. During the Cold War, the only thing that prevented the United States and the Soviet Union from launching nuclear weapons toward one another was a perverse, twisted doctrine of MUTUAL ASSURED DESTRUCTION. Both nations realized that in to engage in a nuclear war was to assure their own self destruction as a nation.

The development of the Neutron Bomb, also known as an “enhanced thermonuclear radiation weapon” is one of the most perverse of all weapons invented by humankind. Unlike the atomic bomb and the hydrogen bomb which vaporized buildings, environment, and human life, because it is a low yield thermonuclear weapon, the neutron bomb releases enough radiation to kill ALL LIFE, but has a minimum destructive effect on buildings and other structures.

Depending on the pulse of radiation and the range of human life to the blast site would decide who quickly immediate and permanent incapacitation would occur to human life and how quick the radiation sickness from the blast would kill people. It is estimated that within 900 meters from the blast site, there would be immediate and permanent incapacitation of human life, with death from radiation sickness coming within 1 to 2 days. For those who are @ 1300 meters to 1400 meters from the blast site, radiation sickness would occur after several weeks.

POPE FRANCIS 1 AND FRATELLI TUTTI

On October 3, 2020, Pope Francis I released to the world his encyclical, Fratelli Tutti: On Fraternity and Social Friendship (All Brothers, the way Francis of Assisi addressed his followers in his Admonitions)  What follows is a helicopter ride through the encyclical.

Throughout the encyclical Pope Francis I goes into detail how humanity throughout the world is regressing back into brutality. How political ideologies are poisoning not only those who are non-Christian but how Christianity itself has become poisoned. His solution to the destructiveness of war and violence is embracing the teachings of Jesus on love and nonviolence, something I have already expounded upon in the words of Gandhi, Merton and Dr Martin Luther King Jr.

Pope Francis then addresses the evil and injustice of war.

256. “Deceit is in the mind of those who plan evil, but those who counsel peace have joy” (Prov 12:20). Yet there are those who seek solutions in war, frequently fueled by a breakdown in relations, hegemonic ambitions, abuses of power, fear of others and a tendency to see diversity as an obstacle.[237] War is not a ghost from the past but a constant threat. Our world is encountering growing difficulties on the slow path to peace upon which it had embarked and which had already begun to bear good fruit.

257. Since conditions that favor the outbreak of wars are once again increasing, I can only reiterate that “war is the negation of all rights and a dramatic assault on the environment. If we want true integral human development for all, we must work tirelessly to avoid war between nations and peoples. To this end, there is a need to ensure the uncontested rule of law and tireless recourse to negotiation, mediation and arbitration, as proposed by the Charter of the United Nations, which constitutes truly a fundamental juridical norm”.[238] The seventy-five years since the establishment of the United Nations and the experience of the first twenty years of this millennium have shown that the full application of international norms proves truly effective, and that failure to comply with them is detrimental. The Charter of the United Nations, when observed and applied with transparency and sincerity, is an obligatory reference point of justice and a channel of peace. Here there can be no room for disguising false intentions or placing the partisan interests of one country or group above the global common good. If rules are considered simply as means to be used whenever it proves advantageous, and to be ignored when it is not, uncontrollable forces are unleashed that cause grave harm to societies, to the poor and vulnerable, to fraternal relations, to the environment and to cultural treasures, with irretrievable losses for the global community.

258. War can easily be chosen by invoking all sorts of allegedly humanitarian, defensive or precautionary excuses, and even resorting to the manipulation of information. In recent decades, every single war has been ostensibly “justified”. The Catechism of the Catholic Church speaks of the possibility of legitimate defense by means of military force, which involves demonstrating that certain “rigorous conditions of moral legitimacy”[239] have been met. Yet it is easy to fall into an overly broad interpretation of this potential right. In this way, some would also wrongly justify even “preventive” attacks or acts of war that can hardly avoid entailing “evils and disorders graver than the evil to be eliminated”.[240] At issue is whether the development of nuclear, chemical and biological weapons, and the enormous and growing possibilities offered by new technologies, have granted war an uncontrollable destructive power over great numbers of innocent civilians. The truth is that “never has humanity had such power over itself, yet nothing ensures that it will be used wisely”.[241] We can no longer think of war as a solution, because its risks will probably always be greater than its supposed benefits. In view of this, it is very difficult nowadays to invoke the rational criteria elaborated in earlier centuries to speak of the possibility of a “just war”. Never again war![242]

259. It should be added that, with increased globalization, what might appear as an immediate or practical solution for one part of the world initiates a chain of violent and often latent effects that end up harming the entire planet and opening the way to new and worse wars in the future. In today’s world, there are no longer just isolated outbreaks of war in one country or another; instead, we are experiencing a “world war fought piecemeal”, since the destinies of countries are so closely interconnected on the global scene.

260. In the words of Saint John XXIII, “it no longer makes sense to maintain that war is a fit instrument with which to repair the violation of justice”.[243] In making this point amid great international tension, he voiced the growing desire for peace emerging in the Cold War period. He supported the conviction that the arguments for peace are stronger than any calculation of particular interests and confidence in the use of weaponry. The opportunities offered by the end of the Cold War were not, however, adequately seized due to a lack of a vision for the future and a shared consciousness of our common destiny. Instead, it proved easier to pursue partisan interests without upholding the universal common good. The dread spectre of war thus began to gain new ground.

261. Every war leaves our world worse than it was before. War is a failure of politics and of humanity, a shameful capitulation, a stinging defeat before the forces of evil. Let us not remain mired in theoretical discussions, but touch the wounded flesh of the victims. Let us look once more at all those civilians whose killing was considered “collateral damage”. Let us ask the victims themselves. Let us think of the refugees and displaced, those who suffered the effects of atomic radiation or chemical attacks, the mothers who lost their children, and the boys and girls maimed or deprived of their childhood. Let us hear the true stories of these victims of violence, look at reality through their eyes, and listen with an open heart to the stories they tell. In this way, we will be able to grasp the abyss of evil at the heart of war. Nor will it trouble us to be deemed naive for choosing peace.

262. Rules by themselves will not suffice if we continue to think that the solution to current problems is deterrence through fear or the threat of nuclear, chemical or biological weapons. Indeed, “if we take into consideration the principal threats to peace and security with their many dimensions in this multipolar world of the twenty-first century as, for example, terrorism, asymmetrical conflicts, cybersecurity, environmental problems, poverty, not a few doubts arise regarding the inadequacy of nuclear deterrence as an effective response to such challenges. These concerns are even greater when we consider the catastrophic humanitarian and environmental consequences that would follow from any use of nuclear weapons, with devastating, indiscriminate and uncontainable effects, over time and space… We need also to ask ourselves how sustainable is a stability based on fear, when it actually increases fear and undermines relationships of trust between peoples. International peace and stability cannot be based on a false sense of security, on the threat of mutual destruction or total annihilation, or on simply maintaining a balance of power… In this context, the ultimate goal of the total elimination of nuclear weapons becomes both a challenge and a moral and humanitarian imperative… Growing interdependence and globalization mean that any response to the threat of nuclear weapons should be collective and concerted, based on mutual trust. This trust can be built only through dialogue that is truly directed to the common good and not to the protection of veiled or particular interests”.[244] With the money spent on weapons and other military expenditures, let us establish a global fund[245] that can finally put an end to hunger and favour development in the most impoverished countries, so that their citizens will not resort to violent or illusory solutions, or have to leave their countries in order to seek a more dignified life.

It should not be any surprise that there are Christians and Christian Theologians who oppose Pope Francis condemnation of the Just War.

In the October 6, 2020 article,” Pope questions usefulness of Church’s ‘just war’ doctrine”, By Charles Collins, Collins quotes Peter Koritansky, Associate Professor of Philosophy and Religion at the University of Prince Edward Island, who said, “To suggest that war is intrinsically evil would mean that God, in commanding the chosen people to take up arms, commanded them to commit intrinsically evil actions. Similarly, such a suggestion would be contrary to the teaching of the Church, which has clearly opted for a just war doctrine over a pacifistic one.”

Conclusion: There is no Just War. All War is sinful.

To Koritansky’s criticism, I would say that the world is no longer the Medieval Ages in which weaponry was more primitive and incapable of destroying all life on earth. With weapons, nuclear, chemical, and biological that are capable of destroying all life on Earth, war is a SIN, an AFFRONT TO GOD THROUGH WHOM ALL LIFE IS CREATED.

As this is being written, Putin and his Russian military are brutally at war with Ukraine. The sheer amount of violent force against the Ukrainian military will crush them. However, the crushing of the Ukrainian army will NOT be end of the conflict. Ukrainians have formed militia undergrounds that will continue to fight, and kill Russians, just as sure as the Taliban continued to fight and inflict casualties upon the American occupying armed forces. Death will continue to reign and as Thomas Merton wrote so chillingly back in the 1960’s, “But men are consequently returning to the old war gods, the gods that insatiably drink blood and eat the flesh of men. It is easier to serve the hate-gods because they thrive on the worship of collective fanaticism. To serve the hate-gods, one only has to be blinded by collective passion.” As the bodies of dead Ukrainians will stacked one upon another, so, too, will the body bags of dead Russian soldiers will start to be stacked on upon another and sent back to Russia. George W Bush ordered the cessation of news coverage of all the dead bodies of soldiers coming back from Iraq and Afghanistan during the war because of its huge negative impact on the American people. Putin will learn from his own people that war and violence is a dead end, which may end up violently lead to his own death.

For Christianity to have any relevance in the world, Christians must embrace the teachings of Jesus as expressed in the Gospels, and MUST embrace fully the rule of the early Christian Church that the killing of human life is forbidden. To kill, even in defense of one’s self, may not possess the severity of the sin committed by the aggressor, but it must still remain a sin. ALL LIFE MUST BE SACRED, NO EXCEPTIONS.

If, that means, as it did in the early Church that the Christian die rather than take the life of another human being, so be it. Do we as Christians believe what Jesus taught or do we think that the core of Jesus’ teaching was foolery and ridiculous. The challenge and criticism that Gandhi leveled at Christianity must be listened to and taken to heart. ”It is a first class human tragedy that people of the earth who claim to believe in the message of Jesus, whom they describe as the Prince of Peace, show little of that belief in actual practice. I like your Christ, I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ.”

As much as I admire Mahatma Gandhi, I would love to change the present path of Christianity and prove him wrong. As the American Bishops wrote so well in the Pastoral Letter on War and Peace in 1983, ” Jesus Christ, then, is our peace, and in his death-resurrection he gives God’s peace to our world. In him God has indeed reconciled the world, made it one, and has manifested definitely that his will is this reconciliation, this unity between God and all peoples, and among the peoples themselves. The way to union has been opened, the covenant of peace established. The risen Lord’s gift of peace is inextricably bound to the call to follow Jesus and to continue the proclamation of God’s reign (45). In the parlance of American capitalism, “the time has come to put our money where our mouth is.”

The capitalized words in the title are uttered by the prophet, Jeremiah (Jeremiah 20:7) There are times when we, who are in Church ministry, fully understand the sentiment that Jeremiah is uttering here.

Idealistic Perception of Church Ministry as Opposed to the Reality of Church Ministry

There is an idealistic perception of what it is to work in Church ministry by those not doing Church ministry that is diametrically opposed to the reality of actually doing Church ministry. This unrealistic idealism is similar to the story of an unmarried, newly ordained minister giving a sermon entitled, “How to raise kids.” Then he got married and had children, at which he changed the title of the sermon to “Suggestions as to how to raise children.” Then his kids got to be adolescents and he quit preaching on the subject altogether.

In my occasional rants about the shortcomings of Roman Catholicism as an institution, I can be justly criticized by some who say, “If it is so bad, why do you continue to stay? Nobody is making you stay.” This is a good and honest question. In short, the Roman Catholic Church is my religious family. It is dysfunctional contradiction of incredible blessings and incredible shortcomings. It can be a very loving mother and at the same time a real “mutha”. Yet, in spite of all this, the Church still remains my family, as dysfunctional as it is. In our relationships with those we love, we always want our loved ones to be the best they can be. In our relationship with them, we will also call them out when we think they are doing something incredibly unloving.

The Tragedy of Rejection

There is nothing more tragic in human relationships than the utter disregard and rejection of a loved one by another. This is just as horrifically tragic when an institution that purports itself to be the beloved of God, the “Bride of Christ”, utterly disregards, rejects, and condemns those within its community. A close inspection of how Christianity as religious institutions have so badly treated those who love it, (e.g. the burning at the stake of St Joan of Arc, the Spanish Inquistion, the 30 years war, the religious persecutions and atrocities, the treatment of the LGBTQ+ community, etc), all done purportedly in the name of God, reveals how Christianity, in all of its manifestations and denominations, has betrayed the mission and teaching of Jesus.

At its best, humanity is a sinful mess, and Jesus chose to immerse himself in the midst of that sinful human mess, inclusively welcoming them all, especially those who were messed up the most, into relationship with him. His own religious authorities hated him so much, they plotted with the Roman occupiers to torture him and execute him. Given the history of Christian denominations over history, we all are guilty of the same sin as Jesus’ own religious authorities.

So Why Are You Still Here?

So, back to if all Churches are as messed up and hypocritical as they are, why do you remain to continue to minister in them? Why don’t you just shuck it all and quit? After all, there is some truth to a saying of WC Fields, “If at first you don’t succeed, try, try again, then quit. No use being a damn fool about it.” I think my answer to not shucking it all is tied up in this passages of the prophet, Jeremiah, which shows up every other year in the daily readings of the Mass.

The Cynicism (and Realism) of Jeremiah

“You seduced me, LORD, and I let myself be seduced; you were too strong for me, and you prevailed. All day long I am an object of laughter; everyone mocks me. Whenever I speak, I must cry out, violence and outrage I proclaim; The word of the LORD has brought me reproach and derision all day long. I say I will not mention him, I will no longer speak in his name. But then it is as if fire is burning in my heart, imprisoned in my bones; I grow weary holding back, I cannot!”  (Jeremiah 20:7-9)

The word “seduce” has been translated differently from Bible translation to Bible translation. In the original translation of the New American Bible, the word “seduce” was translated as the word, “duped.” “You duped me LORD, and I allowed myself to be duped.” In some other translations, the word is “enticed” or “deceived”. I think the words seduced or enticed are too mild. I prefer the word dupe or deceived because it more accurately states the fact. Why?

There are times, like Jeremiah, when those in Church ministry are so miserable that they think, “Just what was I thinking when I decided to become a priest, or a deacon, a minister, a religious sister or brother?” I know that in some marriages, the same question can arise, as well.  If we are so miserable, why do we stay? Are we incapable of doing something else? Are we all sado-masochists who get some kind of kinky high from the physical, emotional, and spiritual exhaustion and pain of ministry?

Perhaps, our decision is described, as Bill Murray, in the movie “Stripes”, says to his fellow enlistees about enlisting in the army, “But there is one thing that we all have in common. We were all stupid enough to enlist in the Army. We’re mutants.” I concede that prior to ordination, religious profession, to ministering in the Church, there is some idealistic fairy tale musings about ministry. I also concede that in religious formation there is an element of “duping” happening. Otherwise, why would we jump through all the hoops academically and institutionally to work in ministry? However, I think that in Church ministry it is more than just being mutants who are too stupid to know into what we are getting ourselves.

The Great Commandment

For me, it all boils down to trying my utmost to love God with all my mind, all my heart, and all my strength; and, loving my neighbor as myself.  I didn’t get ordained to wear the fancy vestments when assisting at Mass, nor to preach, nor to be able to baptize, marry, and bury. Nor, did I get ordained to impress and to rise within the ranks of the hierarchy of the Archdiocese of St Paul and Minneapolis. Nor, did I get ordained to please the Archbishop. I didn’t know the cost that ministry would have in my life, on my health, and the impact it would have on my family.  Rather, I got ordained in order to serve God and to serve the people God placed in my life. This remains the reason why I continue to serve in ministry. Without this innate desire to love and serve God and neighbor, then our ministry is nothing more than “noisy gong and a clanging cymbal” that the apostle Paul describes in First Corinthians. (1 Corinthians: 1).

The Church, in all its incarnations and denominations, remains a very messy, sinful, hypocritical, and, at times, unloving environment in which to serve. As my wife, Ruthie, continues to love me and live with me, in spite of my own messiness and flaws, so too, I still love the human mess that is the Roman Catholic Church. I remain and at times complain because I love it and know that it can rise to something that could be so much better, so more loving, so more like Christ who instituted it. Jesus did not pick the best when he chose his disciples, but somehow, as flawed and messed up as they were, God worked through them anyway. Through the Holy Spirit, Jesus continues the pattern of not always calling the best to ministry, yet in spite of ourselves, the Church remains and the work of Christ continues.

Hope in Acknowledging We Are ALL Sheep

Pope Francis has called the clergy to not live above and apart from the “sheep” whom we served, but to live and smell like the sheep we serve. Pope Francis is so spot on. What is going to be required is that all who serve in Church ministry, especially the hierarchy, learn that we are not only to smell like the sheep we serve, but we live in solidarity with the sheep that we serve, and acknowledge that we are ALL sheep, with all the same smell, with all the same messiness, and with all the same need for conversion. There is only ONE Shepherd, and we are NOT the Shepherd. When we acknowledge and live in solidarity with the communities we love and serve, then, the Church will begin to live more faithfully the world changing mandate of Jesus to “Love as I have loved you.”

I remember, as a junior high student, reading the book, “Deliver Us From Evil,” written by Dr. Tom Dooley. The book was an account of Dooley’s ministry as a naval doctor to the refugees fleeing the Communists of North Vietnam. Within the book, Dooley cited numerous atrocities committed by Communists upon Catholic Vietnamese. Dooley left the Navy and later created medical clinics in the nation of Laos, teaching hygiene and treating the many illnesses and injuries suffered by the people of Laos. He almost died from malaria on four occasions, and suffered from a variety of intestinal parasites. He threw himself into his work as a doctor and dangerously lost over 60 pounds (from 180 pounds to 120 pounds) in his zealous work as a physician. He wrote two more books about his ministry as a physician to the Laotian people before being diagnosed with melanoma, later succumbing to that cancer at the age of 31 years in 1961.

John F Kennedy based his creation of the Peace Corps on the work of Dr Tom Dooley, and posthumously bestowed the Congressional Gold Medal upon Dooley.

A Cause for Canonization to Sainthood that Soured Over Time

Following his death, people were quick to take up his cause for canonization as a saint in the Catholic Church (Dooley was a devout Catholic). However, as year passed and more information about Dooley surfaced, that cause was abandoned.

As government records became declassified, it was revealed that in addition to his work as a doctor, Dooley was also an agent of the Central Intelligence Agency, who made frequent reports about the activity and movement of Communists in Laos and Vietnam. It was also revealed that some of the atrocities Dooley cited about Communist treatment of North Vietnam Catholics and Laotians in his book, were largely fabricated by the CIA. The CIA used the stories of Dooley to influence the federal government to step up its involvement in the politics of South East Asia that led to the United States being mired in the Vietnam War for many years at a great cost of life not only to Americans but to the Vietnamese.

It was also revealed that Dooley left his commission as a Naval doctor because he was a homosexual. Some of his homosexual liaisons with people, reportedly including celebrities like Rock Hudson and Jim Nabors, got back to his superiors in the Navy. Rather than disgracing Dooley by dishonorable discharging him from the Navy, to preserve his honor and their own, they allowed him to resign his naval commission.

Why I Celebrate This Day as his Feast Day

So often in the Catholic Calendar, the Church officially assigns feast days of Saints. In the early Church, persecuted by the Roman Empire, Mass was often celebrated in secret in the Catacombs of Rome upon the sarcophagus of dead Christians. The early intent about remembering dead Christians, many of them martyrs, was to prevent them from haunting those Christians still alive. However, that rather primitive and superstitious intent was replaced with that of honoring those who gave their lives in love and service to God and to others.

I have long created my own “Calendar of Saints” that may include those officially recognized by the Catholic Church, but often includes many who would never pass the rigorous and, I believe, corrupted process to official status of Saint in Roman Catholicism (I am sure much money passed hands and influenced the canonization of such people as Pius IX, Pius X, and most recently John Paul II), while many other people more deserving the title of Saint have been passed over. My calendar of saints include Dr Martin Luther King Jr, Mahatma Gandhi, Dorothy Day, Brother Roger Shutz (who created the religious community of Taize), many of my friends, colleagues, and, of course, my family members.

Saints are Incredibly Flawed People

We often think of saints as people whose lives were never flawed, people who lived perfect lives. When we really look at the lives of saints, we find many of them extremely flawed human beings who struggled with their own set of weaknesses. Lets face it, St Paul of Tarsus, was a religious zealot who engineered a religious genocide of Christians before his own conversion to Christianity. Francis of Assisi, whose image occupies many a garden, was a bit of a sexual reprobate prior to his conversion. Ignatius of Loyola was a soldier of fortune whose morality was incredibly flawed prior to his conversion. Lets not even begin to broach the subject of Augustine of Hippos sexual addiction and perversity prior to his conversion. It is rare for an official canonized saint to NOT have a dark side in his or her life.

The Power of God’s Love, Compassion, and Mercy

In each life of a saint, the power, the love and the compassion of God exerts change in the life of a saint. It is not like that after a saint’s conversion, his or her dark side disappeared never to assault them again. Far from it. St Paul complains and begs God in his Second Letter to the Corinthians to remove the thorn in his side that plagues him daily. God responds to Paul that God’s grace is enough to save him, for that thorn, that acknowledgement of his weakness and vulnerability allows God to grow all the more in his life. In short, God’s lover, mercy, and strength overwhelms the weaknesses and the sins in our lives.

Saint Judas Iscariot?

One of the most reviled people in the history of Christianity is Judas Iscariot, whose betrayal led to the torture and execution of Jesus of Nazareth. The Florentine poet, Dante, reviled him so greatly that he places Judas Iscariot on the lowest and most horrific level of Hell, with a three faced Satan gnawing on the body of Judas for eternity. Yet, could the mercy, the compassion, and love of Jesus not even save the eternal life of his own betrayer. If we believe what Jesus taught in the Gospels, we would have to answer, yes.

The American poet, James Wright, wrote a most moving poem, he entitled, “Saint Judas.” Here is the poem in its entirety.

“When I went out to kill myself, I caught
A pack of hoodlums beating up a man.
Running to spare his suffering, I forgot
My name, my number, how my day began,
How soldiers milled around the garden stone
And sang amusing songs; how all that day
Their javelins measured crowds; how I alone
Bargained the proper coins, and slipped away.

Banished from heaven, I found this victim beaten,
Stripped kneed, and left to cry. Dropping my rope
Aside, I ran, ignored the uniforms:
Then I remembered bread my flesh had eaten,
The kiss that ate my flesh. Flayed without hope,
I held the man for nothing in my arms.”

Saint Tom Dooley

And, so, we return to the subject of Dr Tom Dooley as a saint. It is true that Tom Dooley had an immense ego. It is true that Tom Dooley self-promoted and initially exaggerated what he did for his own gain. It is true that Tom Dooley, along with the CIA, fabricated Communist atrocities to push a political agenda that engaged the United States into a war in Vietnam in which the United States would eventually be defeated. It is true that Tom Dooley was a homosexual but, in my mind and the belief that God created him a homosexual, that is anything but sinful. What God creates cannot be sinful, for God only creates that which is only good, including our gay brothers and lesbian sisters and all in the LGBTQ+ community. This is a pillar of faith.

What stands out for me in the life of Dr Tom Dooley, is that in spite of all the facts that would cast doubt on his being a saint, his work and his ministry to improve the lives and the health of Vietnamese refugees and Laotians overwhelmed his false ego. What arose in his life was a driving desire to sacrifice himself and his own health in order to serve the needs of others. Whatever might have been his initial incentive to do the work he did in Laos, self-promotion, being a tool of the CIA etc, he ended up being driven to continue to serve the people of Laos until he was no longer able to medically treat them because of the failure of his own health.

And, so, in my calendar of Saints, today is the feast day of Saint Tom Dooley. He enters the number of so many saints that have walked this earth. I figure that if James the Greater and John, who were willing to throw all the other apostles “under the bus” in order to sit at Jesus’ right and left hand, are still honored and revered as saints, Tom Dooley is right there to be honored and revered as a saint. And, if Tom Dooley can be saint, perhaps, I might have a chance to be a saint, too.

In the Catholic Church, we entered into what is known liturgically as “Ordinary Time”  the day after the Feast of the Baptism of the Lord. Yesterday, was the Second Sunday in Ordinary Time. One of the Gospel readings we often hear on this Sunday is the very familiar story of the Wedding at Cana from John’s Gospel. In this Gospel story Jesus initiates his Messianic mission. In the Jewish theology and imagery of Jesus’ time, the afterlife with God is often described as a Wedding feast to which many are invited to sit around the table of God and join in a feast in what all human needs and wants are satisfied. In the theology of John’s Gospel, it is significant that Jesus begins his Messianic mission at a wedding feast.

The Wedding of Cana Facetiously

I am sure that the following is neither supported by scriptural exegesis or academic theology, however I have often reflected with some amusement that one of the reasons the bride and groom ran out of wine is that Jesus and his disciples crashed the party. Mary, his mother, may have been invited to the feast, but when Jesus and his friends tagged along with Mary, they helped to consume wine that had been reserved only for a specific number of people. Now, I don’t know that that is the reasoning that Mary used to compel Jesus to turn vast jars of water into wine, but it would be one heckuva good reason for Mary’s command. Jesus may have been the Son of God, but he was also the Son of Mary, and if he knew what was good for him, he was not going to ignore his mom.

The Wedding of Cana and Its Impact on Our Lives

When we take the Gospel story of the Wedding of Cana and combine it with the other two readings for the day, namely, Isaiah 62:1-5 and 1 Corinthians 12:4-11, we begin to reflect on that to which God is calling us this new Ordinary Time in our lives.

God, through Isaiah, tells Israel that no longer will Israel be perceived as forsaken by God. Rather, within Israel, the glory of God will shine forth for all the nations to see. Paul in his first letter to the Corinthians speaks about how the Spirit of God dwells within all members of the early Christian community. While all these gifts were incorporated in the one person of Jesus, through the Spirit of God, those gifts are distributed among the entirety of the Baptized.  Corporately, we are the living and breathing One Body  need.

The Spirit of God has given each member a specific gift or mission to do on behalf of Christ present in the community. Paul tells us that we receive those gifts from the Spirit of God that are specific to our individual mission. The messianic mission of Jesus the Christ did not end with the Ascension of Jesus to Heaven, but rather, the Body of Christ, that is, those baptized in Jesus, are called to carry on Christ’s messianic mission to bring Good News to the world.  

What the Wedding of Cana is Not

During this new Ordinary Time of Jesus in 2022, we don’t recall the Gospel story of the Wedding of Cana to rehash old, tired, and moldy jokes based on that story (e.g. the priest who is pulled over by a cop for DWI and stating that all he had to drink was water … however, as one who has at times had to consume leftover holy communion wine, in spite of Catholic Church teaching about the “accidents” of the Blood of Christ, the Blood of Christ retains its alcoholic content. If you consume enough Eucharistic wine, you can get drunk on the Blood of Christ, but I digress). Nor do we tell the Wedding of Cana to reflect on this marvelous miracle that happened to the unwitting bride and groom and wedding guests at that wedding feast. It is a time, however, that we must reflect on what gifts and mission the Spirit of God has for us this new year of 2022.

A Time to Discern our Spirit Given Gifts and our Mission

This is absolutely necessary each new year of our lives. As we age and circumstances in our lives change, we must continually discern as to how we use the gifts the Spirit of God has given in service to God and to neighbor. This discernment may take a while.

Using myself, as an example, during the first year of my retirement from active ministry, my mission was to recover from four surgeries and an infection. Having finally accomplished that, my second year was spent trying to discern the mission God had for me during the first deadly surge of this Covid pandemic. Now, within the third year of retirement, I have had to discern how to continue some of what I had done, e.g. facilitating and co-facilitating needed support groups, and as to what mission God is calling me presently.

In the song, “It’s alright Ma, I’m Only Bleeding,” Bob Dylan penned the words, ”Those not being born are busy dying.” Life never stands still but is always evolving. When life quits evolving, life dies. We must continue to discern the mission to which God is calling us. Our mission will evolve and change from year to year. Where or to what is God calling us this new year?

My friends,

I wish to express my great thanks for all your prayers. They have been a great comfort and assist in yet another surgery. Having surgery at a major hospital in the midst of a pandemic surge is challenging. Ruthie and I got to the hospital at 8:30 am. She was allowed to only be there for a short time and then was required to leave. From about 9:45 am to when I left post-op, she basically sat in the car until she was called to pick me up. Because we live so far away from the hospital, it did not make sense for her to go home. The fact that the temperature was sub-zero, made things all the more difficult for her. The surgery lasted about 90 minutes. Ruthie and I got home around 2 pm. Our daughter, Meg, had to work that day, but set up the portable ramp into the house. Our son, Andy, and our grandson, Aidan, were on hand to wheel me into the house, thank God. With the bitter cold and snow, it was more of a challenge than it would have been in warmer months.

While I am unable to put full weight on my right foot, because of the location of the incisions, I am able to put weight on the point of the heel of my right foot. That is a great assist as I transfer to and from my chair, commode, and bed to my knee scooter. Trying to negotiate our cracker box 1930’s house in a knee scooter is a challenge and frustrating, but not impossible. I think I used up all the profane words the Benedictines taught me in high school within the first day and a half, and then decided instead of calling upon Almighty God to damn all the obstacles, chose to take a deep breath and think of how to negotiate the obstacles. I now reserve those words the Benedictines monks taught me in high school for the conservative majority of the Supreme Court and most of those in the political party of trump, and traditionalists and restorationist clergy and bishops who are in opposition to Pope Francis in the Catholic Church.

I am extremely blessed to be married to one of the greatest nurses on this planet. Ruthie takes such good care of me. I try to fend for myself as much as I am able, but still rely upon her to bring breakfast and supper to me. Every night, Ruthie changes the surgical dressings. So far everything is looking good. There is very little discharge from the two incisions (one long one on the top of the foot and one on the side of the foot in which screws were inserted), and no sign of infection thus far (thank God!). The pain block lasted a good 24 hours after surgery and began to wear off at around 2 am Wednesday morning. That was the first time I took any pain medication, with the exception of extra strength Tylenol, to take the edge off the pain (about a 7 on the pain scale). I took another pain med at 5 pm Wednesday and took my last pain med at 10:30 pm that same day. Since then, I have very little pain.

I will be seeing my surgeon January 28th to get the stitches out and get x-rays (hopefully everything is healing the way it is suppose to). Though it is a few days past the normal two week period, my surgeon is down in New Prague that day making it a lot easier for Ruthie and I. If everything looks good, I will be able to begin putting full weight on my right foot again by the last Friday in February.

With occasional journeys to the bathroom, or to the kitchen to get an apple or fill up my water thermos, I spend most of my time in the chair with my feet elevated. Time is spent petting the dog (a lot), listening to podcasts or books, watching television, paying bills, working a little on income tax, and the occasional nap. It has been six months since I have composed music, so I will return to composing another song cycle of music based on the Canticle of the Creatures (Canticle of the Sun and Moon) written by Francis of Assisi. With the exception of reading the Star Trib every morning, I try to abstain from watching the news on cable television, a near occasion of sin for me, opting to focus my attention on something else when Ruthie watches her news programs in the morning and afternoon.

Because I am expending very little energy, I monitor what I eat and how much I eat. Of course, prayer remains major pillars in my day. I remember all of you in prayer in the morning, and remember many who have gone before me in life, in the evening. All in all, while I had not included in my plans for this winter and new year a broken foot, a Covid infection, and surgery, I still have so very little about which to complain. I was largely asymptomatic during the Covid infection, thanks to the vaccinations and booster. I was utterly surprised to find that I tested negative a week ago for Covid, understanding that following a Covid infection, most people continue to test positive up to 90 days following the infection (due to the shedding of dead virus). The care and love I receive at home by my family is extraordinary.

It is easy to look over all the hospitalizations and surgeries I have had during my life and be bitter and shake my fist to the heavens in anger at God. What I have learned from all those hospitalizations and surgeries is that as hard as they are when being experienced, they have been moments from which I have grown as a person and as a deacon. They also have been moments in which I find myself not set a part from a suffering humanity, but in solidarity with a suffering humanity. I have come to a far greater understanding of words written by a woman who suffered from a chronic illness. She wrote, “The words that I hate to hear people say is, ‘There by the grace of God go I.’ These words are a mean spirited condemnation by those who look down on others who are different from themselves because of illness, injury, addiction, or sexual orientation. After years of suffering from my chronic illness, I prefer the words, “Here by the grace of God I AM!'”

So, week One is now past, week Two has begun, and a week from this Friday, I will know whether the surgery remains successful. I pray that when the first day of March arrives, I will be able to get out and walk, perhaps with a walker, and see you all. In the meantime, I will pray for you as you continue to pray for me.

Peace,

Bob Wagner

One cartoon strip I follow in the Star Trib is Pickles. It features an elderly couple. In yesterday’s strip, the old man joins his wife on the couch. As he lies down on the couch and places his feet on his wife’s lap, he states, “I didn’t think I was going to make it to 2022.” His wife looks at his feet on her lap and responds, “Don’t be too sure of that.”

New Year Trepidation

I think that strip reflects a sentiment shared by many of us the past several years, especially so during this prolonged pandemic. We approach each new year with a great deal of apprehension and uncertainty, tinged with hope that it will not be as bad as the year we had just survived. I have found by experience, that entering a new year is a lot like carefully testing the ice before walking on a frozen lake. It is done very carefully with some trepidation and a plan if the ice does not support your weight.

The Carefree New Years of Youth

Now look at the picture above. That picture was taken 4 days after Ruthie and I got married in 1974. Ruthie’s BFF is Cheryl DuCharme. When we were younger, Rob and Cheryl and Ruth and I use to play 500, usually accompanied with a lot of rum and coke. On this December 31st, Rob and Cheryl were over at our apartment on Larpenteur Ave and we played 500 far into the night. We were both newly married couples and were eagerly anticipating long and happy lives with our spouses far into the future. There was no trepidation or apprehension about entering another new year. Totally unaware of the challenges that awaited us in the future, without any hesitation we jumped feet first into the waters of the New Year.

What did the future provide for us in the New Year of 1975? For Ruthie, it was a little bit of a hangover from the rum and coke she had consumed. For me, it was leading the music for the morning Masses at Maternity of Mary on Dale Street, St Paul (about six blocks away … I made sure not to drink a whole lot at our 500 games, knowing full well that I had to be up early to do music at the Masses). By February, Ruthie would be pregnant with our first child, Andy. I would get a K-12 vocal/general music teaching position in two forgotten town on the Southwestern Minnesota prairie, with Ruthie working in a small little hospital. Rob and Cheryl would continue to live their lives in the Midway area of St Paul, Rob learning to cope with his gradual visual degeneration. We would learn that not all adventures were going to be exciting and wanted, but some were very unwanted and very challenging.

January 1, the Holy Day

For the longest time, January 1 was a holy day of obligation in the Catholic Church, It was the Feast of the Circumcision of Jesus, albeit, not a very pleasant experience for the infant Jesus … curious why it was celebrated all those years. After Vatican II, Pope Paul VI called the holy day, World Peace Day. Then Pope John Paul II renamed it Mary, Mother of God (as if Mary needed any more feast days in the calendar year. I think her feast days outnumber those of Jesus … I will have to count to make sure).

As I wrote yesterday in a video card sent to friends, this year, I will put aside the Mary, Mother of God designation of the Day and return to that of World Day for Peace. The very first reading for this day is that wonderful blessing from the Book of Numbers, “May God bless you and keep you. May God’s face shine upon you …” Even the Gospel account for today from Luke’s infant narrative of the worship of the shepherds, and Mary reflecting on the events that transpired at the birth of Jesus is filled with a sense of peace.

We must remember that Judea was a war torn land, occupied by a Roman army. Judeans were coerced by the Roman Emperor to travel to their places of birth to register for a Roman census. Joseph and Mary had to navigate some pretty hostile land to make it from Nazareth to Bethlehem, at a time when Mary was 9 months pregnant. Judea was not a place of peace at the time of Jesus’ birth. And, as Matthew’s infant narrative will relate, King Herod, a puppet king of Rome, would send his military into Bethlehem to slaughter all male children, a slaughter that Jesus, Mary, and Joseph narrowly escaped, followed by another dangerous journey to Egypt as war refugees.

The Psalmist of Psalm 23 does not tell us that we will be without violence in our lives, or be without great hardships. He states very clearly that we all will walk through the Valley of Death and darkness. But the Psalmist also assures us that we will not make that journey alone. God will travel by our side as we make that journey, guiding us and loving us along the way.

2022 January 1st, A World Day of Peace

So it is with this assurance that I enter the year 2022. As the Number’s reading reminds me, I am very loved and blessed by God. As Psalm 23 states, I will not make this journey alone. God will accompany me through 2022. And, as the Gospel passage for today states so very clearly in Mary reflecting on all these things in her hear, that even if violence and uncertainty rages around me, the in-dwelling, innate peace of God rests within me to calm me and reassure me.

47 years ago, Ruthie and I got married at St Bridget of Sweden Catholic Church in Lindstrom, Minnesota. On that day, what I wanted the most in my life happened when Ruthie and I exchanged our vows. I am sure the wedding lasted 60 minutes, but I was so caught up in the what was happening in my life, the time passed so very quickly.

Ruthie was the first in her family to be married. Ten years after we had been married, she told me that as her parents escorted her up the aisle, her dad kept on telling her, “You can get out of this if you want to. I won’t be mad.” It was a good thing Ruthie waited until her dad and I were good friends before she told me that anecdote. Truth be told, I totally understood why he said that. His beautiful daughter was getting married to a newly graduated music major, whose only job was as an x-ray aide at Miller Hospital (I was a glorified wheel chair jockey). I wouldn’t have a full-time teaching position for another 9 months. In many ways, I was still a bit of a screw up who was head over heels in love with his daughter. This Christmas, I wrote him thanking him for allowing me to marry his daughter.

Remembering our wedding in 2011, I wrote this poem.

The moment for which I have waited
from the time I first proposed to you,
arrives like music on the air.
Chosen scriptures read,
homily preached, all unnoticed,
unheard by me, so utterly
captivated am I by you
kneeling at my side.
I pinch myself, “Am I dreaming?
Is it really you next to me
and not some hologram?
Is the culmination of al
for which I have wished
and hoped, actually happening?”
We stand and as the priest
says, “repeat after me,”
you begin, “I, Ruth, take you Bob
for my husband …”
Rings placed on proffered fingers,
the mutual signaculum
of covenantal love.
A kiss seals the covenant,
life takes on the dream.

© 2011. Deacon Bob Wagner. All rights reserved.

Having gotten married at 7 pm on a Friday evening, by the time the wedding, the dinner, and reception was over, it was nearly midnight before we started the drive up to the Duluth Radisson. It was bitterly cold out, Nixon had imposed a strict 55 mph speed limit, so it was a good 2 hours prior to our getting to Duluth. Every time I was tempted to speed, a Highway Patrol would enter the freeway and tail us. This occurred the entire trip up to Duluth. Gad! Ruthie had worked the night shift the day of our wedding and had only gotten a couple hours of sleep before she needed to get ready for the wedding. She thankfully got a couple of hours of sleep in the car on the cold ride up to Duluth.

Only able to afford to stay at the Radisson in Duluth for a couple of nights, we tried to make the most of our stay. At the time, our favorite alcoholic beverage was rum and coke. With a quart of rum and a 2 liter bottle of coke, and the ice machine down the hallway, we had plenty to drink at little cost. Ruthie did introduce me to real Chinese Food on our honeymoon. Prior to this, my only knowledge of Chinese food was the Choy Mein served at a school lunch. I was in 2nd grade and refused to eat it. I told the nun that it looked like someone threw-up on a plate. After reminding me that poor children in China were starving, and making me miss noon recess, while I looked at the disgusting mess on my plate, it soured any curiosity about ever having any Chinese cuisine again.

We walked in the -25 degree weather to the Chinese Lantern. The restaurant all decked out in red and black decor. Needless to say, given my prior experience with Chow Mein, I was apprehensive about having any Chinese food. Ruthie convinced me to try sweet and sour pork. OMG! Was that tasty! Far better than that crap I had been served as a second grader. I have always stated that it is Ruthie who introduces me to the best in the world, and that first taste of Chinese was just a beginning of a love for Chinese food.

The one feature of the Duluth Radisson is a revolving restaurant on the top of the hotel. It was a very pricey meal, but a very classy and delicious meal. As we enjoyed our meal we were given a panoramic view of Duluth. Many years later, we continue to travel to Duluth (now in the warmer months), to stay at the Radisson and to eat at the top of the Radisson.

As the picture, above, illustrates, it was not all lovemaking and eating and drinking. We still wanted to make some time for entertainment. Part of that entertainment was playing double solitaire. In Ruthie’s family, a major form of entertainment is playing cards. The preferred family game is 500, and at the time we got married, her dad was really into playing double solitaire. Over the years, different card games and other games come into vogue. For a while Yahtzee was huge. Now, the game is one called Golf.

While dating, Saturday was date night and on most date nights we went to see a movie. Knowing we would be eating at the top of the Radisson that night, we decided to see a matinee. At that time, Duluth was in a bit of a depression. There were only three movie theaters. The big Miller Hill Mall with its cineplex had yet to be built. The three movies playing in Duluth the weekend of December 27th, 1974 were: 1)Deep Throat; 2) The Devil in Miss Jones; and, 3) Winnie the Pooh, and Tigger, Too! What to see, what to see. We had the choice of two pornographic movies and a Disney cartoon movie (though it did have an old black and white Zorro feature before the cartoon). Which film did we see? Was it Linda Lovelace in her memorable role? Was it Marilyn Chambers in another one of her memorable roles? Or was it Tigger? The answer is … “the wonderful thing about Tiggers, are Tiggers are wonderful things …”.

For our tenth wedding anniversary, with three children, Andy, Luke, and Meg, and awaiting the birth of our fourth child, Beth (on Jan 11th), we couldn’t afford to do anything special for our wedding anniversary. Our meals out were pretty much confined to A&W, and frozen pizzas. So to commemorate our wedding anniversary, I composed this song for Ruth.

For those in the musical know, a fugue is a short two measure melody that gets repeated over and over in different ways. It is a joyous, celebratory fugue, done more in the style of Aaron Copland (think his ballet Appalachian Spring). I enjoy it still to this day. FYI, even in slow part, the fugue is repeated but in a form called augmentation in which the fugue melody is slowed down a lot. Where is it, in the low notes of the left hand. Well, that’s enough music nerd stuff.

Happy Anniversary my bride!

There was a wonderful article about the Capra movie, “It’s A Wonderful Life”, in the Star Tribune this morning. The movie was released in 1946, one year after the end of World War II. While it was reasonably received by the movie critics at the time, it was not as well received by the public. In fact, in terms of money, it was a flop, not breaking even with the cost of making the film. Not even the star power of the film, Jimmy Stewart, Donna Reed, Lionel Barrymore, could produce the profits needed to make the movie popular.

Why did it flop?

First, it is a dark film.

Unlike many other Christmas films made at the time, e.g. “Going My Way”, “The Bells of St. Mary’s”, “Holiday Inn”, “Miracle on 34th Street”, it is not a happy film. People generally go to movies to be entertained, not depressed. It mattered not to audiences, that in the movie, “Holiday Inn”, that Bing Crosby and Fred Astaire are dancing and singing Irving Berlin tunes around in black face at an inn that Crosby owns and only opens on national holidays. Something like that film would be viewed as offensive these days. All that mattered to audiences at that time was happy songs that could be danced to and hummed by them. (Note: the song, “White Christmas” debuted in that film.) People wanted happy endings. Why?

The Christmases from 1914 to 1946 had been consistently very “dark” Christmases.

World War I, the war that was to end all wars, killed over 16 million people. The Spanish Flu killed over 50 million people world wide in 1918. These two world tragedies were followed by a world wide depression that lasted many, many years, throwing families into destitution. Farmers lost their farms throughout the United States because of the Great Depression and the Dust Bowl. Just when the world began to lift itself out of the darkness of the Great Depression, the world, and the United States, were plunged into the horrific violence and genocide of World War II. Darkness was a major part of people’s lives.

I remember my mother, growing up in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, telling me that the Steel Mills of Pittsburgh were running day and night at such a high pace during World War II (making the steel needed to construct weaponry for the war effort), that the pollution was so thick in that city, you could barely see the sky because of the smog that hung over the city. Imagine for a moment living in a city in which the air was so befouled it was hard to breathe, and a sunny day was rare. Might you get depressed? Of course you would.

So, with multiple decades of dark Christmases, is it any wonder that “It’s A Wonderful Life” was not greatly embraced by people?

We must remember is that the movie is about a man who is contemplating suicide at Christmas. An angel is sent to earth to try and steer this man from dying by suicide. In its telling, a review of the man’s life from the time he was a little boy is reviewed. We see how he always put others first before himself. We see how he sacrificed his dreams to serve others. We also see how he despairs when he finds that his chief rival is ready to ruin the man and his young family. The man decides that he is worth more being dead, rather than being alive. The last third of the film is dark indeed when he experiences what the world would have been without him being in it. Thankfully, he realizes that his assumption about his life being worthless was wrong, and the angel restores him back into the world.

Even though there are light, wonderful Frank Capraesque moments in the film, it is essentially a dark, and moody film. After all that people had suffered for decades, they would rather have lighthearted fare like Holiday Inn, with all its racist undertones, and happy, light tunes that everyone could whistle and to which they could tap dance.

The “Good Old Days”

The comedian, W. C. Fields, was fond of saying, “Ah, the good old days. May they never return.” What Fields observed is that it is easy to look back fondly on past days with a degree of sappy nostalgia, ignoring the reality of what it was REALLY like during those “good old days.”

At the risk of sounding fatalistic, I contend that there never was a time when everyone was at ease and there were no problems or concerns. As just the history from 1914 to 1946 points out, human life always has had its challenges. While we may nostalgically look back at our own “Christmas Story”, when we were hoping to get our Red Ryder BB gun, those times were filled with all the struggles we have today.

Let’s take the movie, “Christmas Story”, as an example. While Ralphie’s big concern was not getting beat up by the bullies of his school and neighborhood and he wanted that Red Ryder BB gun, in the real world of that time, the Korean War was being fought and many of his classmates were getting infected by Polio, that is, until that time it was mandated by the government that all kids get vaccinated with the Salk vaccine.

As a baby boomer, I grew up with the spectre of nuclear holocaust over my head. We had Nuclear Explosion drills in our schools, in which we would get below our desks and put our heads between our knees, covering our heads with our hands, as if that would protect us from being instantly incinerated by the fire storm caused by a hydrogen bomb. As a kid, I lived with the fear of a nuclear war for many years. The very real threat of nuclear annihilation is present in the World War III song, that satirist and musician, Tom Leher composed and performed in 1961, “So long mom, I’m off to drop the bomb, so don’t wait up for me.”

After the Cuban Missile Crises was thankfully resolved, and the Soviet Union pulled its missiles from Cuba, we replaced that crises with the very long, very bloody, very costly Vietnam War. That War hung over the heads of all young people throughout all the Christmases of that time. I remember as a teenager being in church on Christmas Day. The woman sitting next to me in the pew wept throughout the Christmas Mass. Why? She had just received news from the War Department that her son was killed in Vietnam on Christmas Eve. I remember another very dark Christmas during my Sophomore year in College waiting to hear whether I was going to be drafted to fight in that war (I nobly declined a student deferment to be in solidarity with many of those my age who were not in college). It was a time when who was being drafted was decided by the lottery. My number was not chosen by the draft board.

We keep on trying to find a time when there was no hardship in the world at Christmas, but it seems that as one crises ends, another takes its place. In the 1980’s we had the HIV pandemic. That hit many of my liturgist/liturgical musicians in church music very hard, many of whom died from HIV during the 1980’s and 1990’s. We just ended over twenty years of war in Afghanistan and Iraq. How many Christmases were adversely affected by that never ending, poorly run war?

And now, we are facing our second Christmas under the cloud of Covid-19 and its many manifestations. Many feel so hopeless. Many wish for the good old days when Covid-19 was not here. With what decade would you like to replace it? 1914 to 1918 when people were dying on the battlefields of France in World War I? 1918 to 1919, when over 50 million died from the Spanish Flu? 1929 – 1939 when the world fell into the Great Depression? 1940-1945, when the world was immersed into the blood bath of World War II? 1950 to 1953, when many American lost their lives in the Korean War, and children and adults were being infected by Polio? Would you want to go back to the threat of nuclear annihilation of the Cold War period, the Vietnam War, HIV pandemic? No matter where we turn, each decade with all its Christmases have, for want of a better word, sucked.

There is no perfect Christmas.

I sit here in my chair, writing this reflection, with my broken right foot elevated and with a breakthrough Covid infection. Many years of church ministry have taught me that there is no “perfect Christmas”. That is the primary lesson from the Christmas movie, “Christmas Vacation.” Clark Griswold, in that film, is trying to manipulate his family into having the perfect Christmas, which he entitles, “The Griswold Family Christmas.” For those of us who know the film well, all his plans for the perfect Christmas blow up in his face … with great comic effect.

One of the hardest days for me in church ministry was Christmas Eve/Christmas Day. I told people I would take Holy Week with all its multiple liturgies over one Christmas Eve/Christmas Day. By the last Mass, and the last “Merry Christmas”, I was emotionally, spiritually, and physically exhausted. Scrooge’s sentiment about people being buried with a stake of holly through their hearts and boiled in their own pudding, was one with which I could resonate by the last Mass on Christmas Day. That is why when I returned home my beautiful bride would have a drink with brandy, sweet vermouth, a couple of cherries, and a few ice cubes prepared for me so that I could unwind.

The Christmas Season is a very busy time for funerals. Many of “The Twelve Days of Christmas” could often be filled with funerals, as those with terminal illnesses would target Christmas Day as a goal to be met before they would die. There were many December 26th funerals over 42 years of ministry. I once had five wakes and five funerals in a row immediately following the liturgies of Christmas. With many in my family working in hospitals and nursing homes, it was rare for any of my family to not be at work on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day.

In fact, it was at the last Midnight Mass on Christmas Eve I played, that I decided to retire from active ministry. Two of my mentors in the diaconate died suddenly from heart attacks preparing to celebrate Midnight Mass. I thought to myself that last Christmas Eve night I played, “I’ll be damned if I will die getting ready for Midnight Mass.” And, so, made the decision to retire on June 30th of 2019.

The Lesson of It’s A Wonderful Life? Hope in the midst of darkness.

What a movie like “Its’ A Wonderful Life” teaches us and why it is so pertinent to us today, is that the one thing that is constant and shared in the lives of all human beings is darkness at this time of year. However, as dark and dreary and scary as this time of year may be for us, hope is not extinct but very much present.

We all know that historically, Jesus was not born on December 25th. Historians and astronomers have pinpointed the birth of Jesus around the time we celebrate Easter, at the birthing of the lambs. Christianity established the 25th of December initially as a response to the pagan bacchanalias celebrating the lengthening of daylight following the Winter Solstice. Theologically, the early Christians used nature as a metaphor to illustrate that just as in nature, daylight begins to lengthen minute by minute at this time of year, the light of Christ pierced the darkness and violence of human life in all of human history. At the time of Christ’s birth, Judea was feeling the darkness and oppression of the occupying Roman army and the Roman Empire.

The darkness that we are experiencing now is no different than that suffered by our parents, our grandparents, and the myriad amount of people in our family ancestry. As we sit with the threat of Covid and its new incarnation, Omicron, as I sit looking at surgery in the new year and the long recovery following that surgery, I feel hope. The love of God, incarnated in Christ at Christmas, is very much present in those I have around me who love me.

The other lesson that “It’s A Wonderful Life” teaches us, is that it is very important to reach out to those who are experiencing darkness, experiencing hopelessness and be the light of Christ to them. As others incarnate Christ’s light and love to us, so must we also, incarnate Christ’s love and light to those who feel unloved.

My first Christmas Eve at St Stephen’s Catholic Church in South Minneapolis.

St Stephen’s was a parish that based its parish mission on the Social Justice Doctrine of the Catholic Church. Up to the last few years, when the parish abandoned its outreach to many of the poor and homeless in the inner city of Minneapolis, St Stephen’s was noted for its outreach to the homeless, running a homeless shelter for over 40 years, and providing services to all who lived on the street. Those who worshiped at St Stephen’s were often broken people when they came, but the welcome of Christ, embodied by the church community, brought healing and wholeness to their lives. I remember a homosexual parishioner who said to me that prior to becoming a parishioner at St Stephen’s, he was contemplating suicide, believing the lies often spoken by the leaders of religions about his sexual orientation. At St Stephen’s, he discovered that God loved him dearly and accepted him just as he had been created.

This one Christmas Eve, at the Children’s Mass, a homeless man showed up at church. He wore a vividly colored purple suit. He also was intoxicated. He came and sat in the front pew and wept throughout the Mass. It was a cold winter night, and he had no place to stay. Because the parish’s homeless shelter was filled, and one of the requirements to stay at the shelter was that those staying had to be sober and not using drugs, this man could not stay there. New to the parish, I did not know how to respond to this poor man. I reached out to a gay couple at church with their young children. I remember one of the men, a social worker, approaching the homeless man following Mass and sat down with him. He listened to the woes of the homeless man who them embraced him wept on the gay man’s shoulder. After consultation with his partner, they decided to place aside the plan they had made with their children, and then took the homeless man with them to find him shelter for the night. This gay family incarnated the light and love of Christ to a homeless man desperate for love.

Conclusion

Yes, these times are very dark in the world due to illness, political unrest, economic unrest, and so many other factors that are a part of our present lives. But the light and love of God continues to reaches through that darkness awaiting us to receive and to grasp.

All the readings for today proclaim the same concept. For God, greatness does not emerge from among the powerful, the rich, and the mighty. Rather, it is from the most insignificant, the least powerful from which greatness emerges.

From the prophet Micah (5:1-4a), we hear: “You, Bethlehem-Ephrathah too small to be among the clans of Judah, from you shall come forth for me  one who is to be ruler in Israel.” In Hebrews (10:5-10), we hear: When Christ came into the world, he said: “Sacrifice and offering you did not desire, but a body you prepared for me; in holocausts and sin offerings you took no delight. Then I said, ‘As is written of me in the scroll, behold, I come to do your will, O God.’“ And in the Gospel, we hear the story of a pregnant teenage Mary going to visit and assist her very aged, and very pregnant cousin, Elizabeth. It is of this very humble, very powerless young teenager, that Elizabeth acclaims, “Blessed are you among women,

and blessed is the fruit of your womb. … Blessed are you who believed that what was spoken to you by the Lord would be fulfilled.”

What is not included in the Gospel is Mary’s response to Elizabeth, which we call the Canticle of Mary. In her response, Mary acknowledges her lowliness and insignificance and marvels that God selected her to be the God-bearer. And, like Hannah many centuries before, Mary reiterates that the mighty, the rich, and the powerful will be deposed by God, and, in their place God will raise the lowly and insignificant to places of power (Luke 1:46-55).

As will be related in the liturgies of Christmas, Jesus is not born from a rich and powerful Judean family, but is born poor, in a stable filled with animals, of poor, refugee parents. When Jesus emerges to begin his public ministry, it is not from the capital of Jerusalem, but from the backwater village of Nazareth, a village that is considered by the elite of his time as a place of disrepute.

What we are reminded in today’s readings is that God accepts us in our own state of lowliness. In spite of the brokenness we may have in our lives; in spite of the sins or addictions with which we struggle daily, it is from our own brokenness, our own insignificance that God calls us forth to serve God and others. It is not important as to whether we think we are worthy or good enough to be called, but rather, what is important is that God deems us worthy to be called and to serve.

What is required of us? The Psalmist tells us in Psalm 51(8-10a, 18-19). “Behold, you desire true sincerity; and secretly you teach me wisdom. Cleanse me with hyssop, that I may be pure; wash me, and I will be whiter than snow. You will let me hear gladness and joy; For you do not desire sacrifice or I would give it; a burnt offering you would not accept. My sacrifice, O God, is a contrite spirit; a contrite, humbled heart, O God, you will not scorn.”

Jesus will remind us later as he begins his public life that if we desire to be great, we must first be the servant of others. The first in this life, will be the last in the eyes of God, and the last and lowly in this life God will place first.

As we prepare this week to celebrated the Incarnation of Jesus, let us cast aside the notion that we are not worthy enough to take part in the celebration of Christmas. The time has come for us to shuck away from us our preconceived notions of greatness and power. We are reminded that God sets the human order of significance and importance on its ear. In God’s schema, greatness emerges only from those who are humble and lowly. Let us prepare ourselves accordingly.

This Sunday we celebrate the 3^rd Sunday of Advent, traditionally known as Rejoice Sunday. In comparison to the more somber readings of the past two Sundays, these readings are filled with hope. At this darkest time of year, with the world reeling from another variant of Covid-19, the political disruption and violence in our nation, as more and more facts are being revealed about the January 6^th insurrection, the rise of murder and and other acts of violence in our communities, we are in desperate need for hope.

Zephaniah and Paul remind us in their readings (Zep 3:14-18a and Phil 4:4-7), that, in the midst of the violence in our fractured society, as much as we may think that God has abandoned us, and we may feel like throwing our hands up in despair, we must instead find joy. God is always present to us. This is a theme that is repeated throughout scripture, e.g. Psalm 23. Through all the difficulty, through all the hardships, terrors, violence, and illness, God is always present to us. We do not journey through the darkness and danger in our lives alone. Our God always walks with us. The Incarnation of Jesus is in itself that God loved us so much so as to be one with us. In my own life, facing another surgery with all its discomforts and challenges, I am feeling exasperated, frightened, despondent, and angry. However, my faith tells me that I will not face this alone. God is with me through it all, and it is to this hope and knowledge to which I cling.

The message of John the Baptist in Luke’s account tells us that in order for us to see the presence of Christ in our lives, we need to shuck off all that encumbers us from realizing his presence. For the tax collectors it was to not cheat people for their own gain, for soldiers, it was to stop extorting people, or accusing them falsely of crimes. As we reflect on our own lives, the question we need to ask ourselves is what is it in our lives that prevents us from feeling the joy of Christ’s presence? Whatever it might be, the time has come for us to jettison whatever it is, out of our lives. In doing this, we will not only feel the joy of Christ in our lives, but that joy will be revealed to all we encounter.