Digital Planting

Posted on May 4, 2012 by jkelly

During Lent I decided to run a series called “Scripture Bytes,” which were quotes from the readings, psalms or propers of each day with a related quote from a pope, saint or other christian writer and a picture.  These only went to people who subscribed to them, but the list of subscriber began to grow quite a bit.  Although I enjoyed the challenge of creating them and the process of creating helped me to personally grow closer to Christ this Lent, I was grateful when Easter came and I didn’t have to come up with fresh ideas every day.  It didn’t take long;  however, before I began to hear from our subscribers that they missed getting Scripture Bytes in their mailbox each morning.  I decided to run “Daily Inspirations,”  similar, but much lighter than the themes of Lent and Holy Week.  As a result I’m now married to this daily exercise, but it’s better than cleaning.  Daily Inspirations is growing and I upload them to Facebook, Pintrest and Twitter each day also, to expand our reach even further.

Social Media is amazing.  For thousands of years the Church has worked in small patches of God’s field, sending out missionaries to go forth and “teach all nations.”  Generations of martyrs and saints worked their entire lives to change countries and cultures – one convert at a time.  Today I can look at our Facebook page and see our stats.  We reach nearly 2,000 people a day!  I figure that at this rate we’ll be able to conquer the world for Christ in about a year or so, if everyone cooperates.

The problem is that in the end people need to see faces, look deeply into eyes, listen to voices and feel the love before they buy into belief.  Electronic evangelization, though good, is impersonal, not cuddly.  Other than a photo, which I’ve gotten pretty good at magically Photoshopping 15 pounds off myself, there is no face attached to anything we do on the internet.   There are no eyes to look into to be able to judge whether or not the words are truth.  If you see one of my Daily Inspirations or Scripture Bytes and don’t know who sent it, it might as well have come from Hallmark or another big corporation.  No one’s going to be converted this way.  It’s too easy to hit the like button and move on with your day.

As I see it, my goal as an Electronic Evangelist is to get someone to be curious about where its coming from.  And if they’re curious perhaps they will want to “come and see.”  And if they come and see they might find out.  And if they find out, they might look at a face or hear a voice and decide to stay.  And if they stay, they might become a Saint.  And if they become a Saint…who knows?  I guess a seed is a seed no matter how it’s planted.

 

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The Fine Print

Posted on April 19, 2012 by jkelly

It’s the Easter Season and “all creation is shouting for joy,” but part of me is going back a couple weeks to where Mary meets her Son on the road to Calvary.  As any mother knows it’s far better to have pain and sadness yourself than to watch your child go through it.  But, you’re a mother, and it’s in your job description in really, really fine print.

Medieval Christmas carols would often have the shadow of the cross stretching across the lyrics.  There’s a mention of what is to come, lest we forget that, even though we’re Gaudete giddy,  it won’t always be that way.  Mary had her seven joys, but she  had her seven sorrows to counterbalance them.  There will be sadness coming and for every lovable, smiling Anna there’s a stern Simeon waiting to deliver the bad news.  But we choose to dismiss the inevitable, wanting instead to think about the joys.  I know I did.

I remember the day I gave birth to her, lying in the hospital room watching her wiggling and stretching in her blanket.  The minute I knew of her existence we started having a conversation, so by the time she entered the world I knew her.  I fantasized about what was to come; home made Christmas ornaments, Popsicle sticks, brownie uniforms, peanut butter kisses.  I was ready to help her understand and work through the painful side of life; when her best friend would leave her crying on the playground after harsh words, when she would have to endure the teenage years of self doubt and confusion, the grief of her first crush break-up and the overwhelming loss of her grandmother.  But it ended there.  I didn’t think about having an adult child having to go through adult things.

What happens so often when adults are going through adult things is that their children become innocent bystanders who end up having their spirits trampled and  their hearts broken.  They are handed a grief that they didn’t ask for and didn’t see coming.  But my adult child, going through sorrow herself,  is going to have to watch her children suffer and I can’t put a band-aid on that hurt or make anything feel better.

I’ve been through many, many Good Fridays and so I know there’s an Easter on the horizon, but she can’t see that right now.  When Mary gave her fiat to the Angel Gabriel she couldn’t have seen that Good Friday was waiting for her.   The Incarnation of our God meant that she would have to watch her Son suffer terribly and all she could do was stand by and let him finish what he started.  And now I must do the same for my child.   But, as always, I’ll be there  for her when she needs me, even if it’s only to look down and see that I’m standing by her cross.

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Thomas and the Bum Rap

Posted on April 16, 2012 by jkelly

Poor Thomas, if anyone in history has a bum rap it would be him, saddled for all time with the moniker Doubting Thomas.  The gospels don’t mention where he was when Jesus came to the upper room.  It’s not important.  He was absent, that’s all we know.  It seems to me, though, that since Jesus knew that the apostles were gathered in the upper room, he would have known that Thomas wasn’t there.  So why didn’t he wait until everyone was present?

Thomas had to hear about it second hand.  The biggest thing to happen  in the history of the world and he missed it.  We have to admit that the very idea of someone resurrecting from the dead and dropping by for a visit sounds like a whopper.  Perhaps he thought that Peter was playing a cruel joke.  I’m sure he was in no mood for it.  Just imagine if someone came up to you and said, “Remember your best friend that  you saw cruelly tortured and murdered?  Remember how you saw him dead in his mother’s arms?  Well, he stopped by last night while you were out.  Yep, walked right through the walls.  No, really.”  I don’t blame Thomas a bit for saying, “Yeah, right.  I’ll believe it when I see him and touch his wounds.”

I’m convinced, though, that Jesus came to them while Thomas was out for a special reason.  When Thomas finally got to see Jesus he delivered one of the most important acts of faith of the New Testament, “My Lord, and  My God.”

Jesus didn’t seem the least bit upset by Thomas’ hesitation.  After all, he had just spent 33 years in human form complete with all it’s feelings and emotions, surely he understood why Thomas wouldn’t just jump on the bandwagon.  Yet, Jesus was the supreme teacher and, like all good teachers, he used this as a “teachable moment.”  “You believe in me, Thomas, because you have seen me.  Blessed are they who have not seen me, but still believe.”

     As hard as it is for me to believe based on the testimony of the scriptures, it had to have been more difficult for Thomas because he witnessed the crucifixion.  My belief is a gift from God, a legacy of Thomas’ encounter with the Risen One and Jesus’ teachable moment.  My belief has been tested several times in my life and in my darkest moments I’ve had to struggle to see him.

I think about those who suffer terribly every day of their lives from chronic illness, terrible loss, mental agony, addictions; those who must battle daily to see the hand of God in the hand they were dealt.  I pray for those who feel completely abandoned by God.  How can you believe in a good and gracious God when your heart and spirit has been broken?

Blessed are they who have no good reason to believe, yet still believe.

 

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A Stone’s Throw

Posted on April 14, 2012 by jkelly

Sister held the large gray river rock and prayed for a moment.  Turning to the woman next to her she held it out and said, “Has no one condemned you?  Neither will I condemn you.”  The person who accepted the rock, a secretary, held the rock out to the teacher who was standing next to her.  “Has no one condemned you?  Neither will I condemn you.”  The rock slowly made it’s way around the circle.  Men, women, teachers, priests and secretaries all took the rock in turn and in turn passed it on.

Today I attended a one day retreat for the teachers and staff of our parish.  It’s an unusual time to make a retreat – the week of Easter, but it had to be moved from earlier in the year due to scheduling conflicts and this was the one time everyone could make it.  The theme was “stones.”  Everyone was given a small stone tucked into the plastic name tag holders and we carried them around all day.  The retreat director spoke of the different kinds of stones that we find in our lives; the ones we put in our own ways, the ones others place in our paths and the ones that life has just tossed at us that we have to deal with.  At one point we were told to reflect on these and see what stones were in our paths and what we would have to do to be able to clear the paths for ourselves.

I reflected on the meaning of stones.  Well, for one thing, stones can get stuck in your shoe so that even the smallest little piece of gravel feels like a jagged piece of glass when you’re trying to walk with one sticking into your foot.  You can’t go very long without having to stop and hop around awkwardly on one foot until the culprit is removed.  A stone in the wrong place at the wrong time can stop you cold for a while if you twist or even break your ankle.  Stones that are thrown at your car windows by passing trucks will crack or shatter your windshield and destroy your vision of the road, and it’s practically impossible to go anywhere until it’s replaced.  Stones in front of tombs can sometimes only be moved with help.

So I think about the little stones that stick in my foot, these small annoyances that bombard me every day.  What are the things that I need to remove?  My first clue came with the Gospel reading of today.  After all the events of Holy Week the disciples found themselves muddling about not knowing what to do.  They’d spent three years with Jesus and thought that by this time they’d be working for the new ruler of Israel.  But things didn’t turn out so well.  So they decided to go back to their old line of work, fishing.  After a night of fishing without catching anything they headed back to the shore, probably not in the best of moods, when they see some guy standing there watching them.  He called out to them and offered some unsolicited advice, “Throw the nets over the right side of the boat.”  What a ridiculous thing to say to professional fishermen who’d been up working all night without even a bite.  But for some reason the disciples didn’t mutter under their breath and they didn’t laugh out loud.  They threw the nets over the other side and their boat nearly tipped over with all of the fish.  That’s when they figured it out – that wasn’t just any guy standing there, it was Jesus.  Simon Peter ( I love this part) was “lightly clad.”  I guess that means he was in his underwear, but hey, they’re all guys, right?  So he throws on clothes to jump into the water and begins to swim to the shore.  At that moment I recognized my first stone.  If someone had come up to me and tried to tell me how to do my job, I wouldn’t have been so accommodating.  I probably would have thanked them for their opinion and then talked to myself for the rest of the day.  How dare they tell me how to do my job!  I realized then that my refusal to be open to another’s opinion and advice, and my need to be the one in control was the piece of gravel in my shoe.   The response I make to life’s little annoying stones that I’m trying to walk on is keeping me from seeing Christ in the daily situations that challenge me.  Lesson #1: When Jesus tells you to try something, do it, even if it seems completely “off the hook.”

Then there are the stones in the road that I don’t see coming.  Here I am running through life at full speed.  Things are going great and I’m at the top of my game.  Soon I get too sure of myself, though, and forget to keep my eyes ahead.  I fail to notice a fairly large stone right in the middle of the path.  My life changes suddenly for one reason or another and I find that am unable to avoid it or protect myself.  I lose my balance, my feet to fly out from underneath me, and I’m face down on the pavement with a part of me aching and broken.  This is the kind of stone that forces me to stop for a while and reevaluate the path I’ve been on.  Problems with my family, health issues, financial setbacks – all things that I didn’t plan – demanding my immediate attention.  Sometimes these spills take a while to get over, but eventually I pull it together and go back to the path, perhaps hobbling a bit, but still moving forward. Lesson #2:  When Peter got to the shore he found lunch cooking.  Jesus was waiting for him to come and have a bite to eat and a chat.  When the disappointments or heartaches of life become overwhelming, jump into the water and swim to where Jesus is to be refreshed, refueled, and readjusted.

The stones that come flying at me from nowhere at full speed sometimes have the force to shatter my vision of the road and they do  the most damage.  Separation, anger, broken relationships, loss, sickness, death – these stones are the ones that come out of nowhere and have the force to knock me down hard enough to make me want to give up the race entirely.  It’s too painful to try to stand up again.  Eventually, I might continue on, but I’m not healed at all.  I’m slow and afraid of the path ahead.  Recovery is possible, but not easy.  Lesson #3: The apostles, still dazed and confused, decided to leave the upper room and go back to the familiar, to the beginning, to where they found Jesus in the first place.  That’s where he was waiting for them.  When things are so bad that I feel I can’t go on, I need to go back to where Jesus was when I found him before.  He’s probably still there.

Finally, there is a large stone blocking  the entrance to a tomb in my heart.  Before Jesus made his triumphant entrance into Jerusalem  he received word that his best friend Lazarus died.  He waited a couple days and then went to raise him from the dead.  He told the men there to “roll away the stone,” but  Martha said, “Lord, it’s been four days, surely there will be a stench.”  Now I see this stone for what it is.  It is the one that I don’t want moved because foul, dark, smelly things lay behind it.  I don’t want to deal with it because it’s keeping hidden all the dead things within my soul that I don’t want to see or have anyone else see.  Jesus called Lazarus forth, and when the dead man came out of the tomb he told the people to, “Untie him and let him go free.“   Lesson #4: If I don’t find the help I need to roll away this large stone I won’t give Jesus the chance to work the miracle of new life in me.  I may be bound up and lying with dead things forever and never be able to be free.  Even if I don’t have the strength to move this stone alone, that’s okay.  I think I know where to find someone who is good at moving stones.

At the end of the day, we brought the little stones that we had carried all day up to a small wooden table in front of the altar where there was a basket filled with beautifully polished stones that had crosses painted on them.  We all laid our stones down and exchanged them for one with a cross.  Lesson #5:  When Jesus was raised from he dead his stone had been rolled from the entrance to the tomb.  There is no stone so large, so heavy, so final that it can’t be handed over to Jesus in exchange for one that bears the imprint of the cross and a promise of resurrection.  Very powerful, very cool, a very good day.

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Prayers Well Spoken

Posted on April 12, 2012 by jkelly

It is better to say one Our Father fervently and devoutly than a thousand with no devotion and full of distraction.
— St. Edmund

Saint Edmund must have had ADHD, otherwise he would have been able to get through a thousand Our Fathers without being distracted.  Take it from someone who can only say a complete rosary if she’s pacing back and forth like some kind of caged tiger.  I’ve always admired people who can sit before the Blessed Sacrament for an hour without moving around or get through an entire rosary slowly and thoughtfully as if in a devotional rapture.  I wish I could do that, but I can’t – not for very long.  But that’s okay.  My prayers may not be as elegant, but I usually manage to get in some meaningful conversation with Our Lord as I buzz around from task to task.

I like the way Saint Ignatius put it, “We must speak to God as a friend speaks to his friend, servant to his master; now asking some favor, now acknowledging our faults, and communicating to Him all that concerns us, our thoughts, our fears, our projects, our desires, and in all things seeking His counsel.”

So, praying as Saint Ignatius’ teaches, you can be in constant prayer no matter what you’re doing.  And although Ignatius  used other metaphors, it seems to me that this also describes the daily ongoing conversation of a devoted  husband and wife who have spent many years in love with each other.  Sometimes in marriage words become unnecessary.  There is a communication that goes on under the radar.  Other people can often tell that there’s something going on, but they just can’t quite figure out what it is.  There is a movement, a look, a smile or a laugh that tells the story of the heart.  There is no need to say “I love you” over and over.  The love is expressed in the way they continually share their thoughts and desires and the pleasure they have in simply being together.  Everything they do is done for the benefit of the other.  Because he knows his wife so well he gives her everything he is.  Because she loves her husband so deeply she is totally his.   She wakes thinking about him and goes to sleep contented to hear his breathing.  He cares for the things that she cares for and puts her above all other things in his life.  Their bonds are strong and each lives to make the other happy because each one makes the other complete. They want to be together as one forever.

And this is the love of Christ for his bride, the Church, and the love of Christ for each of us; a love so strong that he gave his life freely so that he could be with the one he loves.  So this is how I think of prayer – a continuous conversation with the one who loves me dearly, the one who knows me well and still wants to be with me, the one I’ve chosen to be with through all eternity.

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An Easter People?

Posted on April 10, 2012 by jkelly

“Do not despair.  We are an Easter people and Hallelujah is our song.” Pope John Paul II (the great)

Really?

Sometimes it’s so hard to see the Easter in people.  We don’t seem to be able to be nice to each other for one day of the year, much less be ensconced in the joyful life of the Resurrected Christ.  Really.  I remember the days of the Easter Parade, when families put on their new Easter suits and dresses, bonnets, gloves and new shoes and walked along the lakeside after Mass to take family photos and look at everyone else’s new suits, dresses, bonnets, gloves and new shoes.  (Oh, no! Now I’ve got that song stuck in my head, complete with Judy Garland’s voice).  This year there was a violent mugging in that same area.

The organ, a.k.a. my office,  is at the front of the church, which means that I get the same view of the assembly as the celebrant.  At seven o’clock pm every Sunday night our parish has what is affectionately known as, “The Last Chance Mass,” because we have the only Sunday night Mass in the area, which is useful for doctors, nurses, police and those who celebrated a bit too much the night before.  On Easter Sunday night I had just finished the Communion hymn and noticed that people were leaving the church in droves, almost literally running for the doors.  It’s not written down anywhere, but we think it’s called the first dismissal.  They missed the good part, “Go in the peace of Christ.  Alleluia!  Alleluia!”  They didn’t seem to care that they were missing the good part.  They wanted to bolt out of the parking lot to get home in time to watch “Dancing with the Stars” or whatever.  The Easter People had just received the Son of God, yet the host hadn’t even cleared their esophagus before they started reaching for their cell phones.  And it wasn’t just kids.  Even the senior citizens leaning on their walkers got into a foot race trying to be the first ones out of the Church doors.  Have we become so accustomed to receiving the Risen Christ that it means nothing to us?

I can imagine how Jesus felt when he was trying to explain how he is the Bread of Life who will sacrifice his own life for his people while watching many of his disciples check their watches and head for the exits.  It’s pretty darn hard to be an Easter people.  Catholics who completely buy into the faith have to be a bit cracked.  After all, we talk  to bread.

At the Easter Vigil I watched four courageous people who, of their own volition and desire, became members of the Holy Catholic Church.  They bent over the font and willingly accepted the water that was poured on their foreheads.  It couldn’t have been an easy choice to make.  They must have thought deeply and sincerely about what they were getting into.  After all, Catholics are disliked and mistrusted by a lot of people.  There are still many people who can’t get past the idea that we talk to bread, pray the Hail Mary and won’t budge on the issue of birth control in spite of the fact that they have poll results that say that the majority people are in favor of it.  Personally, polls mean nothing to me.  After all, Jesus was crucified after Pilate took a poll and found that the majority of the people in the crowd were in favor of crucifixion.

One of my favorite quotes from Bishop Fulton Sheen is, “There are not over a 100 people in the U.S. that hate the Catholic Church, there are millions however, who hate what they wrongly believe to be the Catholic Church. Which is, of course, quite a different thing.”   In other  words, most people don’t really understand us, and many of those who are us don’t understand us, which makes the Easter people thing a bit more difficult to communicate.

Pope John Paul II said, “Do not despair,” so I won’t.  Alleluia!

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Lillies and Pot Pie

Posted on April 9, 2012 by jkelly

Everything’s finally quiet.  Jesus has risen, we all sang “Alleluia!” and the world has gone back to work.  A beautiful Lenten season filled with meditation, scripture, prayers and penance culminated in a week filled with emotional highs and lows; intrigue, agony, death and resurrection against a backdrop of a spectacular spring sky and cherry blossoms.  But even with all of that I get the feeling that this morning Easter was put away with the bunny decorations and baskets.  It lasts less than the time it takes to bite a chocolate bunny’s ears off.

I confess to having a similar feeling.  Church divas get a bit overwrought from all the services and rehearsals, and it’s hard to keep that fresh Alleluia feeling when you’re exhausted and can’t deal with one more trumpet player or program.   But there is a sweet perfume in the air coming from some beautiful white Easter lillies on my breakfast bar.  Their smell brings me back to Easter morning, their trumpet shaped petals a reminder of what I’ve worked so hard to be part of,  explaining once again that Easter lasts for fifty days.  Today has the same excitement and joy as yesterday.   Tomorrow looks just like it, and so on for the next several days.  We hear about Jesus appearing to Mary and the apostles in his glorified body.  Can you imagine those poor guys?  It must have scared the heck out of them.  We wait for Thomas to show up and get angry because he thinks the apostles are telling him a wild story when they should know better, and then turn around and make one of the most profound professions of faith ever uttered, “My Lord, and my God.”  We walk the road to Emmaus and imagine how it would feel to have someone you’ve just watched die sit down and have dinner with you.  We follow the adventures of the apostles as they struggle to get the Church started in spite of being uneducated, rough fishermen.   We wonder about how Paul, the early Church’s worst nightmare, was knocked to the ground, soundly dressed down by the voice of Jesus, and turned around his life to become one of the greatest apostles.  And even though the last bits of the Easter Ham, the bone and some scraps, became some bodacious pot pie soup today, my Easter adventure continues.

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The Empty Tabernacle

Posted on April 6, 2012 by jkelly

I’ve been planning and playing the Holy Week liturgies since I was a kid, but it gets me every single time – the empty tabernacle.  I know it’s coming, I’m ready for it, but it’s still a shock to see the tabernacle with the door open wide to show that there’s nothing there,  he’s gone.  It’s one of the most poignant visuals I can think of.  I feel tears well up in my eyes every year as I see the empty space that once contained the Son of God.

It’s all gone.  No candles, no cloths, no plants – nothing.  It’s a hall, no different than any other social hall.  It always hits home, that there’s only one reason a Catholic church is different than every other building and it’s because of the real and constant presence of our Savior.

Holy Thursday is exquisite.  The symbolism and beauty are unmatched, yet the sadness permeates the room.  Even the Gloria loses it’s usual joy.  Our happiness is about to be taken away.  We sang, “Stay Here and Keep Watch with Me” over and over.  Many people did stay for adoration.  Yet I know that I’ll go in for morning prayer this morning and the autopilot will kick in and I’ll go to genuflect and it will hit me again.  Why?  To whom am I genuflecting?  I look at the tabernacle and remember.  I may as well be in a gymnasium.   There’s no reason to genuflect, but I make a small bow anyway because it doesn’t seem right to ignore the fact that he was there just last night.

I know many people who are enamored of miraculous apparitions and have even traveled to see the sites of apparitions.  I don’t know if certain people are having Mary or Jesus come to them.  I’m not in charge of determining whether or not these are real.  But I know that my faith doesn’t depend on miracles or apparitions.  There is a miracle that happens every day in millions of tabernacles around the world.  Jesus is present there.  What else do you need?

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Funeral

Posted on April 5, 2012 by jkelly

For a family there  is no good time for a funeral.  It’s Holy Week and we buried one of our parishioners today.  Being part of the bereavement team I have some interaction with families during the time they are preparing to say goodbye to someone they love dearly.  We have a group in the parish call the Arimatheans.  They attend funerals to represent the parish, send cards and often prepare and serve luncheons in the parish hall for the families.  It’s a much needed ministry since the parish is getting on in years and we’ve been burying our parents.

Joseph of Arimathea, the one for whom the ministry was named, is such an interesting character in the drama of Jesus’ crucifixion and death.  He was a member of the Sanhedrin and is described as “a secret disciple for fear of the Jews.”  He is mentioned in all four gospels a a rich man who was looking for the Kingdom.  After Jesus had been declared dead he went to Pilate to ask him to release the body and Pilate agrees.

From what I’ve read about Pilate,  he was not at all a nice person.  He’s portrayed in movies as a conflicted, tortured soul who desperately wants to get out of the predicament he’s in and suspects that there’s something special about Jesus so that he should save him from the crowd.  In the movies Pilate realizes that the crowd will turn violent if he doesn’t give in, so he washes his hands publicly, thinking that this will get him out of being known for all time as the man who sent Jesus to his death.  Yet, in fact,  he was known to be so ruthless and violent that even the Romans felt he was over the top in his crackdown of those he conquered.  He hated Jerusalem, the Jews, and wanted no problems while he was there.  Why would he even give Joseph the time of day for an audience?  For that matter, why would Joseph, a member of the Council, be found in the palace of a non-Jew?  Pilate often left the bodies of  the crucified hang for days to make sure that people got the point that it wasn’t a good idea to upset the machine, yet he allowed this body to be taken down right away.

It would seem that in a place like Jerusalem someone as rich and influential as Joseph would draw attention when he was out and about, especially when he was doing something out of the ordinary.  I can’t imagine that  his whereabouts would go unnoticed, especially at a time of skulduggery such as Good Friday.  After all, the Pharisees spent a lot of time on their plan to get rid of Jesus, whipping up the mock trial, finding and coaching the “witnesses,”  and making sure that everyone was on board with their demand for Barabbas.  They had gone to Pilate’s palace to get him to see things their way,  which must have been especially distasteful to them.  Didn’t they even suspect that Joseph wasn’t exactly in lock-step with the group?  Even if they didn’t have their suspicions about  him of being a disciple they would surely have figured it out by observing his movements after the crucifixion.  They were so worried about what was going to happen afterwards that they had a guard placed at the tomb, so it’s obvious that they knew where the tomb was.  It was the tomb of a rich man, hewn out of rock.  It couldn’t have added up that this poor dead criminal would be placed in it.

Why would Joseph have given Jesus his own tomb?  It must have cost a lot to have it done by stone carvers.  Why did he need it?  Perhaps he was sick, or getting up in years or maybe it was the custom to have your own tomb done so that it’s ready for you just in case.  Did Joseph fear that the Pharisees would turn on him, or did Joseph already know that it would be needed by Jesus?  Was he privy to the plot to have Jesus killed far enough in advance that he could have it done in time, or was Joseph divinely inspired to have his tomb prepared?  Did he know that it wouldn’t be needed for long?

Jesus’ burial was a rush job.  It had to be done before the Sabbath and the body was covered in blood, which would have  defiled the people who touched it, so they left him in the tomb, rolled the stone in front of the opening and left.  Joseph isn’t heard from again.   Yet, if you look around, you’ll see Joseph still with us in the form of all those who boldly, yet quietly, do the things that need to be done to help someone in need.  All those souls who would give you the shirts off their backs, or their new tombs.

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The Sound of Ultimate Suffering

Posted on April 3, 2012 by jkelly

The verses of Psalm 22, the Responsorial Psalm for Palm Sunday, are chillingly prophetical.  The description of the terrible events of Jesus’ final hours is amazingly accurate.  Jesus is feeling completely abandoned by God, void of any consolation from his Father.  He has endured sorrow, terror, humiliation, mockery, agony, and apparent defeat.  His heart is being torn apart and he cries out, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”

In the movie The Princess Bride, Inigo Montoya is searching for the man in black, a mysterious stranger, to whom he had lost in battle but respected.  The man in black had spared his life and Inigo was convinced that he was the only one who could help him.  Suddenly he hears a loud, sustained, horrific scream of agony.  The man in black was having his life drained from him. “Do you hear that, Fezzik?”, he said to his friend, “It is the sound of ultimate suffering.  My heart made that sound when my father was killed and the man in black makes it now….”

Few hearts escape having to make the sound of ultimate suffering; the loss of someone dear, the destruction of trust, the groan that surges forth from the abandonment you feel when it seems as if everyone has turned away from you, including God.  It is the black hole of despair that even the lights of heaven cannot penetrate.  It is being in dire need of some consolation and finding none.  “I look to the right to see, but there is no one who pays me heed.  I have lost all means of escape. There is no one who cares for my life.” (ps. 142)

Saint Alphonse de Ligouri relates a story about Saint Francis of Assisi.  A man came across Francis sitting and crying loudly.  He asked him why he was weeping and Francis replied, “I weep over the sorrows and disgraces of my Lord: and what causes me the greatest sorrow is, that men, for whom he suffered so much, live in forgetfulness of him.”  Francis began to cry even harder so that the man sat down and began to cry with him.

Fezzik heard the sound, as did the dozens of people walking about the streets, but none of them recognized it.  To them it sounded like a roar.  They stopped for a moment but when they couldn’t identify it they continued on.  Only Inigo  knew what it was.  His intimate experience of the sound of ultimate suffering made him so tuned in to the vibrations of the sound that his heart vibrated sympathetically like the second tine of a tuning fork.

The good news is that God does not abandon.  He does not turn away, nor will he ever leave us alone.  We only hear part of  the psalm on Palm Sunday.  The whole psalm weaves back and forth from despair to confident defiance.   We can see the psalmist bracing his flagging heart to embrace what is to come: “And I will live for the LORD; my descendants will serve you.  The generation to come will be told of the Lord that they may proclaim to a people yet unborn the deliverance you have brought.”  

The Jews gathered there would have recognized the psalm and been able to recite it by heart so that when they heard Jesus cry out, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” they would have known how it ends. Even with his last breath, the sound of ultimate suffering, Jesus triumphs.

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