100 Thanks 2021

100 Thanks 2021

1.     The gift of my priesthood

2.     The gift of being able to offer the Divine Sacrifice of the Mass

3.     The gift of being able to absolve sins in the Sacrament of Reconciliation and liberate the children of God from their sins

4.     The gift of being absolved of my sins when I, as a penitent, go to Confession

5.     The grace of feeling God’s mercy and forgiveness

6.     Long confession lines

7.     Spending those last precious moments with a soul that is getting ready to depart this world and return to the house of the Father

8.     Welcoming a new soul into the Body of Christ through the Sacrament of Baptism

9.     Witnessing the union of two souls in the Sacrament of Holy Matrimony

10.  When those two souls come back every year on their anniversary to renew their marriage vows

11.  When the church fills up with people at a Healing Mass longing to receive the Anointing of the Sick

12.  When the church fills up with people for any reason!

(I usually am so focused on Thanksgiving that I rarely give thanks for Christmas blessings, so…)

13.  The silence and stillness that comes with Advent

14.  When I sit in my chapel on the vigil of the First Sunday of Advent and let that silence help me enter into the Advent season

15.  After sitting in that silence, listening to the Mormon Tabernacle Choir’s rendition of “O Come, O Come Emmanuel.”

16.  The “O Antiphons”

17.  The almost four hours I spent hearing confession during last year’s Advent penance service

18.  The yearly blessing of the outdoor Nativity Scene

19.  The dozens and dozens of cars that stop along Anastasia Avenue every day to take in and take pictures of our Nativity Scene

20.  The wonder in the eyes of children when they behold the Nativity

21.  The prayers of our Blessed Mother and her most chaste spouse, St. Joseph 

22.  The Christmas Eve Children’s Vigil Mass and all the lost sheep who come home that evening

23.  The Children’s Choir singing during that Mass

24.  The peace that comes with Midnight Mass

25.  The Gloria sung at Midnight Mass

26.  The Gloria sung at the Easter Vigil 

27.  The blessed exhaustion that sets in after Christmas 

28.  The blessed exhaustion that sets in after the Holy Triduum

29.  The Holy Thursday Altar of Repose

30.  Being able to deliver a “children’s homily” last Sunday for the first time in 20 months

31.  Learning so much from the insights of children; God’s little ones

32.  St. Therese’s Little Way

33.  “What do you want to be when you grow up?”  “A saint!”

34.  Seeing smiles again: a window to the Divine!

35.  The prayers of the Carmelite Sisters

36.  Psalm 62

37.  St. Teresa of Avila’s Serenity Prayer: “Nada te turbe, nada te espante…”

38.  Having a youth group again and a young adult group too

39.  Holy Water

40.  Perpetual Adoration

41.  Anyone kneeling in adoration of the Blessed Sacrament

42.  That rare occasion when this restless heart is satisfied with a homily

43.  Reminders from the Holy Spirit that come in the form of parishioners who thank me for a powerful homily when I think it was “meh”

44.  When my heart rate at the end of homily is the equivalent or more than the heart rate of my best friend running a marathon

45.  Good sacred music at Mass

46.  That post-Communion Meditation Song

47.  The silence after the post-Communion Meditation Song

48.  The children singing Therese’s “Canticle of Love” on her Feast Day

49.  “Diggin’ deeper, getting more” into the Scriptures and saying things I couldn’t say during a Sunday homily on, of all things, a podcast!

50.  Finely produced bumper music 

51.  Thanksgiving lists from 8^th graders and Kindergarteners 

52.  “Peel Greens” (say if fast five times and you’ll know what a five-year-old is trying to say)

53.  The depth of this year’s 8^th grade lists

54.  The early adolescent silliness in most of the lists

55.  For yearbooks that help add a name to a face (there’s over 80 of them!)

56.  Getting up in front of a classroom full of children again and not windows on a computer screen

57.  Having sports on our school fields again and hearing parents cheering a goal, even if they’re from another school

58.  Staging a musical two years in the making with students and alumni 

59.  Strolling by rehearsals on a Friday afternoon (and subtly teaching a Beast to dance)

60.  Watching teachers pull off the impossible

61.  For the heroism, patience, and joy of our teachers

62.  And the heroism of everyone on the front lines

63.  For delivery drivers and truckers

64.  For the Marines who let me crash their birthday party every year 

65.  All the men and women in the Armed Forces

66.  Out of the blue texts, or better yet, phone calls from former students

67.  A cancer bell being rung

68.  A powerful shower that isn’t “low-flow”

69.  Empty inboxes

70.  Kraft Macaroni and Cheese

71.  Cafeteria cookies and the people who make them

72.  Ice spheres vs. ice chips 

73.  Godchildren

74.  An incredible staff

75.  “Do you have a best friend?” “Yes” “Is he smarter than you?” “Yes”

76.  Shibboleth

77.  Ted Lasso

78.  “You know what the happiest animal in the world is? It’s a goldfish. It’s got a 10 second memory. Be a goldfish.”

79.  Applying that quote to the spiritual life especially when it comes to sins we’ve committed and people we’ve wronged or have wronged us

80.  Roy Kent’s “never settle in love speech” that is NSFTL (not suitable for this list), but I want to scream it to everyone who has ever settled in love 

81.  Baseball in the corn fields of Iowa

82.  ARM ministry

83.  Stimulus Mondays

84.  “Uber rides” and the conversations that stem from them

85.  Giant inflatable water slides that go into the deep end of the pool

86.  The becoming too rare Friday nights when the Backyard Crew is back in session (and the personal triumphs of said crew this year)

87.  Tall white bell towers

88.  The thought of New York City and Rome

89.  Refuge on a not-too-distant island where the door is always open

90.  The Pitching Wedge (also an effective prop during the Cleansing of the Temple homily)

91.  That elusive birdie

92.  That 12-foot putt that I drained last week on the last hole

93.  That elusive redfish

94.  Sunsets in the Keys

95.  The sun rising behind my church

96.  Karaoke nights in Comber Hall

97.  Paciencia y fe

98.  My godmother and her immaculate timing when it comes to knowing that I need her

99.  My childhood best friend who still gets in my face to tell me truths I need to hear

100.                 Memories of my brother

101.                 My 16-year-old nephew finally playing football like his father

102.                 My 13-year-old nephew about to go to Columbus like his uncle (the other uncle)

103.                 My 9-year-old nephew teaching me lessons I never knew I needed

104.                 My father still teaching me after 46 years (thankfully) and passing on his wisdom

105.                 My sister still passionate in ways that I could only dream of

106.                 My brother-in-law being the St. Joseph of his family

107.                 My mother praying the rosary for me daily

108.                 My godson in Cuba, whom I had never met, finally making it to the United States to live in freedom, but just as important, that I was finally able to embrace him (Patria y Vida!)

109.                 My cousins and that we’re doing Thanksgiving right this year 

110.                 That it took me longer than usual to write this list this year, but it allowed me to spend pretty much a whole day reflecting on all the things that I am so very grateful for this Thanksgiving. 

Happy Thanksgiving!

 

Is This Heaven?

In St. Luke’s account of the Last Supper, our Lord tells his disciples, “I have eagerly desired to eat this Passover with you… (Luke 22:15)” Your priests have longed to celebrate the Holy Triduum with you particularly this evening when we celebrate the Institution of the Priesthood and of the Eucharist.  While we were present here celebrating this night last year, we felt like part of us was missing, for on the night in which we celebrate our unique ministry of making Christ present for you to be able to feed you this Living Bread, we had no mouths to feed.  We had no feet to wash.

 

Tonight, our church is filled once again, and we will take up the traditional custom of washing the feet of 12 of your fellow parishioners who represent you.  For me, as your pastor, this is one of the most emotional things that I do all year.  It is as if I take my ministry, my priesthood in these poor and sinful hands, when I kneel down, as our Lord did, to wash your feet.  What we have just heard in the gospel and what we will see here tonight is the essence of the ministry of the priest: humbling ourselves, serving others, not lording over others, but serving tenderly and lovingly with simple gestures of service.

 

This morning our Carmelite Sisters came over to our rectory to serenade us and to remind us with song that, as St. John Vianney says, our hearts must be the beating, living heart of Christ.  This is a special charism of the Carmelite Order, for St. Teresa of Avila knew that priests needed to be prayed for as they were suffering through the Protestant Reformation back then.  Today we priests are a sign of contradiction in a society that has forgotten what is sacred and what is holy. I beg you: never stop praying for you priests.

 

Nuestra patrona, Santa Teresita del Nino Jesús, oraba insensatamente por los sacerdotes y nos ofrece esta oración: 

¡Oh Jesús!
Te ruego por tus fieles y fervorosos sacerdotes,
por tus sacerdotes tibios e infieles,
por tus sacerdotes que trabajan cerca o en lejanas misiones,
por tus sacerdotes que sufren tentación,
por tus sacerdotes que sufren soledad y desolación,
por tus jóvenes sacerdotes,
por tus sacerdotes ancianos,
por tus sacerdotes enfermos,
por tus sacerdotes agonizantes
por los que padecen en el purgatorio.

Pero sobre todo, te encomiendo a los sacerdotes
que me son más queridos,
al sacerdote que me bautizó,
al que me absolvió de mis pecados,
a los sacerdotes a cuyas Misas he asistido
y que me dieron tu Cuerpo y Sangre en la Sagrada Comunión,
a los sacerdotes que me enseñaron e instruyeron,
me alentaron y aconsejaron,
a todos los sacerdotes a quienes me liga
una deuda de gratitud…

¡Oh Jesús, guárdalos a todos junto a tu Corazón
y concédeles abundantes bendiciones
en el tiempo y en la eternidad! Amén.

Yes, our patroness, St. Thérèse of the Child Jesus, would be constantly praying for our priests, but as a good Carmelite, she would always turn to St. Joseph in her prayers.  In this year of St. Joseph, it is only right to turn to the head of the Holy Family as we contemplate what our Lord did for us during these holy days and to contemplate the spiritual fatherhood of the priesthood.  Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI reminds us that: “our meditation on the human and spiritual journey of Saint Joseph invites us to ponder his vocation in all its richness, and to see him as a constant model for all those who have devoted their lives to Christ in the priesthood, in the consecrated life or in the different forms of lay engagement.” (Vespers, March 18, 2009)

In Joseph, Jesus saw a model of fatherhood, a model of a just and holy man, a model of strength and obedience to the Father’s will. Yes, in St. Joseph, Jesus had a supreme model of obedience that he would take with him into his passion.  

This past Tuesday, I began doing the Consecration to St. Joseph and it has truly allowed me to draw deeper into the mystery of these holy days and into the spiritual fatherhood that I have as a priest and on how much I draw from my own father as a model as Jesus drew upon the fatherhood of St. Joseph.

I made no secret that this afternoon I escaped ever so briefly to engage in a yearly tradition that my father and I have: going to Opening Day of the baseball season.  Last night after prayer, I felt compelled to see one of my favorite movies “Field of Dreams” which has so many rich spiritual undertones as does the game of baseball.  People step on to this wondrous baseball field in the middle of a corn field and ask: “Is this heaven?”

Last night, that question resonated with me all the more as I contemplated the mysteries of this holy night.  A slice of heaven is what I experience with my father every year on Opening Day or when we sit silently on the seashore casting our fishing lines into the sea or when he would take me as a child, much like St. Joseph, into his tool shed to teach me, albeit unsuccessfully, how to build things because my father started out as a carpenter.  But the greatest gift that he gave me, and the greatest slice of heaven that he offered me was his insistence, along with my mother, that we experience heaven itself every Sunday at Mass. Fathers and mothers never stop insisting that your family participate in every Sunday Eucharist. This is the other great gif that Jesus gives tonight. 

Yes, today we also celebrate the Institution of the Eucharist where Christ gives us his very flesh and his very blood and in doing so, allows us to experience heaven here on earth.  The great preacher St. John Chrysostom tells us: “For when you see the Lord sacrificed, and laid upon the altar, and the priest standing and praying over the victim, and all the worshippers empurpled with that precious blood, can you then think that you are still among men, and standing upon the earth? Are you not, on the contrary, straightway translated to Heaven, and casting out every carnal thought from the soul, do you not with disembodied spirit and pure reason contemplate the things which are in Heaven?”

 

Yes, this is what we celebrate this evening.  So many mysteries in one sublime celebration.  If the world truly knew what was contained, forgive me, WHO was in our tabernacles.  Our churches would always be filled.  The Eucharist draws us ever deeper into the heart of our Lord which is a heart made for others: for the poor, the sick, the distressed.  This evening we look upon the Lord and ask him: “Lord, allow me to have a Eucharistic heart.  A heart that allows me to take your Divine Presence out into the world.”  We thank God for the gift of the priesthood and for the gift of the Eucharist. One cannot exist without the other. As in every Mass, we are not mere spectators tonight, we participate in this heavenly banquet, this divine exchange, and as we look upon this marvelous tradition of the Washing of the Feet, may we always recall the words of our Lord this evening: “If I, therefore, the master and teacher, have washed your feet, you ought to wash one another’s feet. I have given you a model to follow, so that as I have done for you, you should also do (John 13:14-15).”