Paint Yourself Into The Picture

13^th Sunday in Ordinary Time – Year A

2 Kings 4:8-11. 14-16

Romans 6:3-4. 8-11

Matthew 10:37-42

The passage from 2^nd Kings for today says that the wealthy Shunemite woman and her husband received Elisha into their home with all of the regard due to a holy man of God and, without expecting it, were rewarded with the one thing missing in their lives, the one thing money and rank could not buy for them, offspring, a baby boy! In Matthew’s Gospel today Jesus promises a reward to all those who welcome apostles, prophets, holy men, disciples, even God’s little ones. He demands only (to use a very colloquial form of expression) that we not be clingy or self-absorbed. That’s one way to explain what Jesus was trying to teach the Twelve:

“Anyone who prefers father or mother to me is not worthy of me. Anyone who prefers son or daughter to me is not worthy of me. Anyone who does not take his cross and follow in my footsteps is not worthy of me. Anyone who finds his life will lose it; anyone who loses his life for my sake will find it.”

Jesus demands first place in our lives: before closest kin, before our own selves. He demands that we follow in His footsteps all the way to Calvary. How many spiritual authors have filled volumes trying to explain to you and to me just what that is supposed to mean given our specific station in life! And yet, there’s something very attractive, yes, profound about explaining it with the simple command: don’t be either clingy in your relationships or self-absorbed with regard to yourself.

Why did the Shunemite woman and her husband gain the unexpected prize of a baby boy from God? Who else could have given such a reward? They won, if you will, because they went beyond themselves and their daily affairs (beyond their self-absorption?) to recognize God in their world in the person of a holy man, Elisha. Holy: that is, touched by God, belonging to God, caught up to God’s realm and communicating something of God to others for the sake of the life of the world.

I used to think that a big part of the reason for the increased violence in our world was middle class prosperity, the increased material wealth of a larger cross section of society which made them or us targets for the envy of materially obsessed but less fortunate types disposed to resort to violence in order to increase their share of the pie, if you will. Actually, I am beginning to see that the problem of violence and greed is more than a problem in and of itself. The greater tragedy, if you will, comes with the reverse side of the same coin, namely that our inordinate attachments or obsessions whether for persons or for things render us unworthy of the company of Christ. They hold us earthbound and far from the fullness of life offered to us by our living Lord.

“Anyone who prefers father or mother to me is not worthy of me. Anyone who prefers son or daughter to me is not worthy of me. Anyone who does not take his cross and follow in my footsteps is not worthy of me. Anyone who finds his life will lose it; anyone who loses his life for my sake will find it.”

I’m not sure which comes first in a two-year-old’s language acquisitions: Mine! Or No!... Though our vocabulary may grow and our manners become more polished, some of us ultimately don’t get much beyond staking out our own territory, asserting ourselves or fending off others including God and His will for us.  Indeed, the two great commandments of love of God and love of neighbor are one, two sides of the same coin. My self-absorption or possessiveness effectively leave me out of life’s running both in this life and for eternity. I cannot set myself up in life to win; I need to lose myself in order to find life and enjoy life with the other in God.

So much church art of the Middle Ages and other periods as well, particularly paintings, include portraits of the wealthy benefactors who paid for the artwork. Sometimes they are clearly part of the scene; sometimes they are painted smaller and kneeling in the foreground. In a sense, they could be showing off, but in another sense, they are going beyond their daily affairs to welcome the holy and put themselves in the picture so to speak with the saints at the foot of the Cross. You don’t give out big money for a painting like that without recognizing the holy in life.

You and I need to do something similar, without painting ourselves into a painting on the wall of a church, really without letting our right hand know what the left one is doing. We need to welcome all into our lives as if they were Christ. The breadth and height and depth of our charity, focused on Christ, will be the measure with which we are measured back.

I am sure at this point if I nudged people on a whole series of inordinate attachments and obsessions, I’d get back either the bloodshot stare of rage or the pallid face of desperation concerning a whole series of moral imperatives which people today won’t face in their lives; those crosses they ignore or refuse to take up with Christ. The problem, in good part at least, is self-absorption; it’s clinging to someone or something and missing the visit of the holy man Elisha, who just might leave that gift of God behind, which not only bends stubborn hearts and wills, melts the frozen and warms the chill, but leaves in its train, perhaps not a baby boy, but what he signifies in terms of life and hope far beyond the gusto or you name it which I can grasp for myself on my one time go around.

Ask the Lord this Sunday to open your grasp or grabbing hands and help you to extend your arms in welcome to whomever, be it an apostle, a prophet, a holy man, a true disciple of the Lord or even just one of God’s little ones. For not expecting the gift in return, we can be ever so much more blessed.

Life in Hope

Pentecost Sunday
11 May 2008

“Since all these things are thus to be dissolved, what sort of persons ought you to be in lives of holiness and godliness, waiting for and hastening the coming of the day of God, because of which the heavens will be kindled and dissolved, and the elements will melt with fire! But according to his promise we wait for new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells.” (2 Peter 3:11-13, RSV-CE)

PROPERANTES ADVENTUM DIEI DEI… I heard a very fine Pentecost homily at the annual jubilee Mass of the local province of the Holy Ghost Fathers. The homilist also alluded to the above quoted text from the Second Letter of Peter, touching me in a very particular way, because this is the Scripture quote which stands behind and explains my Episcopal motto. Father’s allusion was drawn from a reflection he offered to the festive assembly on the nature of hope from the Holy Father’s Encyclical Letter Spe salvi.

WAITING FOR AND HASTENING THE COMING OF THE DAY OF GOD … Going beyond striving to live a holy and godly life and thereby contributing to shortening the time of God’s forbearance, lest “any should perish” and “all should reach repentance”, was certainly something that caught my attention when I picked my motto from this passage. I looked at it first and foremost from the point of view of cooperating with God’s grace. Father’s Pentecost homily this year hit me at an opportune moment and helped me to tighten and thereby light another bulb on that Christmas tree of my understanding of these words from Holy Scripture. He helped me better illuminate for my own understanding the aspect of hope involved in St. Peter’s call for zeal.

If you think about it, trying to hasten the day when “the elements will melt with fire” as an effort tied to genuine hope is a notion which needs some head work. Hoping for the establishment of God’s rule is not an instinctive yearning, like longing to be free from unjust constraints and respected by one’s peers. Eagerly awaiting new heavens and a new earth from God is an intelligent choice subsequent to our encounter with the Truth, with the Light and Life of the world. Godless men and women of good will and even non-Christians sadly content themselves with much less. There should be no doubt in anyone’s mind about the difference which Jesus Christ makes. We need only reflect for a moment about the back and forth we find in the Gospels between Jesus and His adversaries, and even between Jesus and His disciples or would-be disciples. Not everyone expected as revealed in the Person of Jesus the Messiah, the Anointed One, the Christ Who was to come into our world! The history of Creeds and Councils helps us understand something of the struggle to preserve the fullness of that faith over the centuries.

PROPERANTES ADVENTUM DIEI DEI… Is it really more than a longing for the establishment of righteousness? Most certainly! The violent wind which was heard to blow in the Upper Room on that first Pentecost, those tongues of fire which settled upon the disciples gathered there with Mary, the Mother of God, in prayer, were certainly for them and for all who witnessed that event the foretaste and promise of the world to come. On that day, everything melted away in fire and hope’s object in faith may not have been seen but was certainly witnessed from afar. This was not only the birthday of the Church, but in a very real sense the Church’s Transfiguration, meant to strengthen the baptized for the scandal of the share in the Cross which would be ours, to make up what is lacking in the sufferings of Christ.

Freedom’s nature and dignity certainly does not allow us to victoriously establish God’s reign by imposing it on the lives of others. As transformed through our share in the prayer and suffering of Christ and His Church, we stand eagerly on the threshold of Judgment and Eternal Life. It is enough. Holiness and godliness will draw others to the Day as nothing else can. The light on the lamp stand, the city on the mountain top cannot be hidden.

Sometimes we hesitate, terrified or at least stymied by the darkness which seems to have devoured us and to have claimed the victory. The Lord Jesus’ temptations in the desert are not always withstood so valiantly by us, His followers, as we falter in hope, while awaiting that Dawn from on High.

Pentecost: caught up into the Mystery of the Most Holy Trinity through the grace of that whirlwind Who is the Holy Spirit, we live in hope of God’s Day. It is more than enough.

Let the Child in!

Mass for Christmas during the Night
2007 - Rosary Monastery - St. Ann’s
Port of Spain, Trinidad


Isaiah 9:1-6
Titus 2:11-14
Luke 2:1-14


“’And here is a sign for you: you will find a baby wrapped in swaddling clothes and lying in a manger’. And suddenly with the angel there was a great throng of the heavenly host, praising God and singing: ‘Glory to God in the highest heaven, and peace…’”

I don’t know about you but I’ve always felt sort of left out when people start speaking about their conversion experiences. As long as it was just televangelists or non-Catholic types knocking on your door of a Saturday, bragging about the date and time their lives had changed having accepted Jesus, it was something I guess one could write off as a bit unbalanced and maybe even untrue. Truth to be told, even Catholic charismatic conversions never worried me much. But if none of that seems right doesn’t there still have to be something that we’ll simply call “growth in holiness”, change, betterment, or progress even in the life of a rank and file Catholic Christian? Shouldn’t the word “conversion” have a meaning for me too? Of course it should!

We’ve just finished a preparatory season in purple: Advent. Where do we find ourselves tonight? Has Advent helped us prepare for Christmas? Are our hearts more open to the Lord who comes? Do we live our lives watching and waiting for the Lord? Is He my hope and my salvation? This is a very tough kind of examination of conscience to make, because it’s not as concrete as pinpointing sins of thought, word or deed, action or omission. In fact, I’d probably say it may even be unwise to try and measure our growth in the spiritual life that way if you, like me, can’t really point to some earthshaking conversion experience like being knocked off your high horse as St. Paul was on the way to Damascus. How does an average Catholic check himself or herself to see how things are going (remembering, please, that we’ve always been taught, and rightly so, to mistrust emotion or sentiment as the measure of our closeness to God)? We cannot, however, excuse ourselves from this type of examination of conscience, this kind of check on our devotion, on how or whether we are living for the Lord. The powerful readings of this Mass in the Night for Christmas are evidence enough that the Light, Who is Christ, shines in and changes the hearts of all the people. What difference does my baptism make in my life?

As I say, this is not an easy check. When all else fails, we can look to the lives of the saints to find a mirror, a solid point of reference for measuring how we are doing in our own lives. Thanks be to God there are lots of saints from every day and time and nearly all walks of life! If you look hard enough there has to be some saint you can identify with or who can be a model and a challenge to help you on your own path to holiness. Now maybe my early life wasn’t that of a “child-star-saint” like St. Catherine of Siena or the Little Flower, like young Aloysius Gonzaga or Dominic Savio. I certainly was not a bad boy, but in all honesty it would be hard to point to heroic goodness in those tender years of my life. Besides, they all died young and holy – I must keep looking. Let us get on to grown up saints and repentant sinners, like St. Paul or St. Peter, like St. Mary Magdalene, or if we dare mention him in a Dominican house, like St. Ignatius Loyola! If a lightning conversion hasn’t taken place, what has happened in my life? Do I belong (like I should) to God with all my heart, all my soul and strength, regardless of my age and state in life?

“The people that walked in darkness has seen a great light; on those who live in a land of deep shadow a light has shone… For there is a child born for us, a son given to us and dominion is laid on his shoulders; and this is the name they give him: Wonder-Counselor, Mighty-God, Eternal-Father, Prince-of-Peace”.

Isaiah’s prophecy simply speaks of hope and of powerful, earthshaking change. Once the child is born, once the son is given, nothing can be the same. How indeed has the Birth at Bethlehem, the Sermon on the Mount, the Last Supper, and Judgment before Pilate, the trudge up to Calvary… how has the Glory of Easter changed me?

I don’t know if my mother could pinpoint the date during my adolescence or preadolescence – I surely couldn’t tell you when – but I can remember very clearly awakening one evening after supper to the realization that my parents loved me very much and I hadn’t really shown them my love or appreciation in return. Having to do something and not knowing what (remember an adolescent), I walked out into the kitchen and washed the dishes. My suspicion is that something similar happens when we give ourselves to God, when we finally recognize how much He loves us and how little we have done in return. But how in my life of faith do I walk out into the kitchen to do the dishes for Jesus when the truth of who he is for the world dawns on me?

St. Paul tells Titus and he tells us: “God’s grace has been revealed, and it has made salvation possible for the whole human race and taught us that what we have to do is to give up everything that does not lead to God, and all our worldly ambitions; we must be self-restrained and live good and religious lives here in this present world, while we are waiting in hope for the blessing which will come with the Appearing of the glory of our great God and savior Christ Jesus. He sacrificed himself for us in order to set us free from all wickedness and to purify a people so that it could be his very own…”

“…we must be self-restrained and live good and religious lives here in this present world, while we are waiting in hope for the blessing which will come…”

Among the voluntary sacrifices we used to suggest to children as a way of bringing joy to their parents and sharing in the sufferings of Christ was going out to the kitchen and doing the dishes without being asked. At the very end of the popular novel, “The Lord of the Rings”, after all the incredible scenes which were painted, the little heroes of the epic story are faced back home with perhaps the biggest challenge of all three volumes of the book, namely together to stand up and say “no” to evil, reclaiming their homes and their land from a wicked group of bullies. They win that victory too and it is perhaps their greatest. Real conversion in the life of a follower of Christ is something like that – it’s not flashy, it’s a roll up your sleeves and get-to-work kind of thing.

The birth of the savior, Christ the Lord, is heralded to the least, to the shepherds, by an angel who gave them the great sign of a bundled up, baby boy, lying in a manger. We’re not talking about show time or ecstasy. Handel’s Alleluia Chorus is not the interpretive key for Christmas but rather the hymn “Silent Night” is.

Come to Bethlehem! Come with all your heart and soul! I am sure Mary will let you hold the baby. Rejoice! Rejoice in hope! The Wonder-Counselor, Mighty-God, Eternal-Father, Prince-of-Peace” is here in our midst. Ultimately salvation is accomplished as our hearts open and we let the Child in, not as we slay the dragon, so to speak, but rather as we walk out to the kitchen to do the dishes without being asked.

Maybe this is all too much of a parable. But too many pious folk fool themselves into believing that they are the righteous and that the crown is theirs, as they sit comfortably with the innkeeper while the Child remains outdoors in the stable. Open your hearts to Christmas! Follow the angel’s invitation to go to the stable in Bethlehem! Leave lots of things aside for the sake of recognizing the son of David, born for us and for us given!

Between Christmas and Boxing Day a lot of food is prepared and here in this country many family rituals are replayed and a lot of socializing is done. It’s a favorite time of year for some and a source of almost desperate anxiety for others. Don’t, no matter how your spend these days, don’t mistake the true meaning of Christmas: it’s above all a time to give ourselves to God, a time when we can finally recognize how much He loves us and how little we have done in return. Keep the angels, the shepherds, the starkness of Bethlehem and its stable, keep the helpless baby boy, who is our savior, always before your mind’s eye. Let Christmas be the date and time of your conversion! Live your life in profound gratitude, wonder and awe! Respond to the love of the Christ Child; react like the shepherds or simply do the dishes without being asked!

Turn the tide!

The Presentation of Mary
Liturgical Blessing of the First Abbess
of Our Lady of the Assumption
21 November 2007, Castries, St. Lucia

Zechariah 2:14-17.
Ephesians 4:2-3, 7, 11-13, 15.
Matthew 12:46-50.

I’ve set my sites awfully high for this homily today, today being the Feast of the Presentation of Mary as a little girl in the Temple at Jerusalem. My goal is to challenge you, to invite you to join me today in turning the world around. As ambitious as that may sound (turning the world around), it’s really nothing more than another way of stating the scriptural challenge: “Be transformed by the renewal of your mind!” The only realistic way to turn a world around is by turning individuals around and one at a time. Change comes of free choice or it doesn’t come at all with us human beings. An ambitious challenge, well, yes it is, but an impossible task, no!

The Feast of the Presentation of Mary as a little girl in the Temple at Jerusalem is a day when the Church celebrates the total dedication of Mary to God’s service. We celebrate her obedience to God’s plans. It is in this sense that we understand the selection from Matthew’s Gospel chosen for this feast: “Anyone who does the will of my Father in heaven, he is my brother and sister and mother.”

On this day, we are blessing the first abbess of the Benedictine Abbey Our Lady of the Assumption, your very own abbey, here in St. Lucia at Coubaril on the Mount of Prayer.

Everything about today, Mary’s feast, Mother Marianna’s blessing, everything lends itself to big challenges. Maybe for that reason I am not hesitating to speak to your hearts and hope for big things from you. Today, I want to speak first of all to the hearts of the St. Lucian women and girls here present, but really my words are addressed to all West Indian women and girls who can or will hear my voice, women young and old. I say to you, “Turn the tide!”… “Turn the tide!” While we’re at it, let’s not leave the men out of this either and I will say to them too, old and young, “Turn the tide!” Be transformed; be renewed by seeking first what Jesus describes in today’s Gospel as “the will of my Father in heaven”. Jesus is inviting you to become part of his family through obedience; He is inviting you to become a “brother and sister and mother” to Jesus. How?

Turn the tide first and foremost, ladies and gentlemen, by calling forth all the vocations in your midst! Turn the tide by calling forth once again in significant numbers female vocations to the consecrated life. Rejoice today with Mother Marianna Pinto and her sisters, ladies; celebrate with them their joy at becoming a full-fledged Benedictine Abbey and at receiving from the Holy See not just a mother superior but a Mother Abbess. Then, do something more to share in their joy. Humbly claim that joy, which is theirs by reason of their consecration, by reason of their vows as Benedictine nuns, claim that joy as your own. I invite some of you; I challenge certain ones among you to claim that joy for yourself. “Turn the tide!” by giving up your resistance to God’s call to join the sisters on the Mount of Prayer. Don’t be carried off on the winds of fortune or misfortune like so many women in our day and time! “Be transformed by the renewal of your mind!” Take your life confidently in your own hands and give it to God! Give it to the one Bridegroom; give your life, your heart to Jesus, who will never leave you! Entrust your life to the Lord who will never fail or betray you! “Turn the tide!”

Don’t get me wrong. There is absolutely nothing wrong with marriage. It is a great vocation which comes from God, a vocation with its own special sacrament, Holy Matrimony. Marriage and family is meant to bring joy and the fullness of life to our world. But the world must know that not all are called to marriage. Not all are called to found a family. Today, to focus on women in particular and on the monastic life in a special way, it is good that we remind ourselves that God the Father’s will for you may be that you find your joy in the vowed life; God the Father’s will for you may be that you find your joy as a nun on the Mount of Prayer. Think about it! Pray about it and pray about it again!

Today’s blessing which the Archbishop will undertake for Mother Marianna is an act of prayer, it is a fervent request on our part, we acting in the name of the Church, we acting while calling upon the intercession of all the angels and saints, begging God to make Mother Marianna holy! We hope she is holy already, but we pray humbly using the word holy and not holier. Make her holy, Lord, because she and her sisters are up to big things for which they need your grace. Who would have ever thought that women from Zambia would come to St. Lucia to learn about the Benedictine way of life? Who could have imagined that Coubaril would deserve the title of “city on a hill top”, that the Mount of Prayer would be the “light on the lamp stand”? You, St. Lucia, are home to something big, which you need to support in every way possible, by your friendship, by your prayer. Do that and do something more by putting your daughters even yet in their mother’s arms on the way, by putting them on the way with Mary the little girl going up to the Temple in Jerusalem. Love wants the very best for our children. We want them to be happy. “Turn the tide!” Give your girls to Christ as chaste brides!

In hard times, Zechariah (our first reading today) prophesied for God’s People that the Lord himself was coming to dwell in their midst. The Lord is among us; we need only open to him through obedience. He won’t force the door, but He is ours if we let Him be.

Saint Paul speaks to the Ephesians and to us today; he encourages us to recognize the special gift each has received from Christ, a gift given for the sake of the whole, given to each of us that we might contribute through our service to building up his body. We are invited to the Lord’s Table as brothers and sisters. We are invited to share His life through obedience to his call.

In the Gospel today, Jesus corrects the natural impression of some of his listeners about the source of Christian dignity. We have special regard for the relatives of important people, just like the man in the Gospel did for Jesus’ Mother and brethren. Jesus points out the dignity and the closeness to Him of all those who obey his Father’s will: “brother and sister and mother to me”, he says.

You see, the world has it all wrong. If you buy into the world’s message, then it would seem that physical appearance, the ability to sing and dance and put on a show, Hollywood or Bollywood, externals are what count. We know better and yet how often we go with the flow and chase after such illusions! “Turn the tide”! Parents, you worry yourselves sick sometimes about your children’s happiness and yet how often it is you who point them in the wrong direction by your own example or maybe you don’t point them at all or fail to shield them from negative, silly or empty influences. Children, you have a certain responsibility here too. You must surely know that you don’t make life any easier on your poor parents by begging, nagging, insisting on having the latest in clothes and shoes and hair.

Parents and children, join me today in turning the world around by your choice to live in the light and firmly anchored in God! “Be transformed by the renewal of your mind!” Young women, challenge our new Mother Abbess by coming knocking on her door! Say to her, “Mother Marianna, could it be that God is calling me (you, not me!) to be a nun in the ancient monastic tradition of St. Benedict?” How wonderful it would be to be part of a house of prayer, a house of study and hospitality, a place of watching and waiting for Christ the Bridegroom’s return, for His heavenly banquet! “Turn the tide”! Miss World or Mr. Universe… No! You’ve got to be kidding! Our goals have to greater. The grass withers and the flower fades. This world, and all its boasts, is passing away. Choose the path up the hill to the Mount of Prayer. If Mother and the sisters send you home again saying, no your call is elsewhere, well you’re the better for having tried and the surer on life’s journey. The point is to do something constructive in trying to discover God’s plans, which are better than my own without a doubt.

When Jesus was presented in the Temple he was still a babe at arms. The tradition recounts that Mary was walking and talking when she was presented in the Temple. Though a little girl, she showed her eagerness to serve the Lord, to be his handmaid. Later in her life, the angel Gabriel announced God’s plan to this young woman who had shown her readiness to obey from her mother’s arms and so she spoke to the angel in the Annunciation and said: “Behold the handmaid of the Lord! Be it done unto me according to thy word!”

You’ve heard the expression “hidden away in the convent”. Well there couldn’t be anything farther from the truth. Our life is very well described as a journey toward the light, from the shadow of darkness, the valley of tears, into God’s own wonderful light. It’s sad that many people haven’t understood that fundamental truth, but it’s no reason for you for any of us to just go with the flow and to continue to chase after things which are destined to perish. Think for yourself, turn things around, “Be transformed by the renewal of your mind!”, “Anyone who does the will of my Father in heaven, he is my brother and sister and mother.” Share in the joy of these Benedictine ladies and their mother abbess! Share in it today! Then, some of you young women, come to share in it more deeply and for a lifetime as Benedictine nuns! Help me turn the world around, one person at a time and starting with you. “Turn the tide!”

Into the Mystery of the Most Holy Trinity

I suppose there was a time when a perfect stranger would dare not have asked personal questions of a young man concerning his marital status and what sort of girl he hoped to marry some day. They certainly would not have done it on TV, but then again the young man would dare not have responded so publicly either. He also would not dare limit his choice of girl, pronouncing himself only on the basis of height, weight, hair and eye color. But it happens now, as I have seen time and again in interviews on TV. I guess one could say, "well, that's TV. In real life, normal people are more reserved about such things and in his heart of heart, even today, a young man is looking not for a blond or brunette with a certain type of bone structure but for a friend and lover, a good mother for his children." Would that it were so.

Although I'd like to believe in the thoughtfulness and purpose of youth, just like I'd like to believe that there's a silent majority out there somewhere which respects life and loves God, the point is that this sad little TV interview I mentioned is not far from where many folks are, both young and not so young. I can remember some years ago a childhood friend called me to tell me that her husband of over 15 years had walked out the door on her for a younger woman. When she asked him why, he responded with a very criptic "You're no fun any more." Sad but true: I suspect there are more folks out there shopping for a marriage partner on the basis of eye color than we'd like to believe. No doubt I'd be kidding myself too if I were to insist that the so-called pars sanior (the healthier part) of society is the greater part. There's lots of good out there, but there's also lots that needs to heal and grow. For all the progress our world may boast about, we need to talk today, perhaps more than ever, about where truth is to be found and what really makes life better, what makes things right in the world. The sad little orphan in the Broadway musical Oliver sings and asks the question in his loneliness, "Where is love?" Where indeed is love? Who is truly happy and why?

An important part of the effort which should characterize our reflection on this day of rest called Trinity Sunday is that theological dimension of the whole doctrine of who God is in His very self. Our effort today is about coming to grips in our individual lives as Christians with the beautiful truth of the threeness of persons in one being. God is one and three. This Sunday, above all others, invites preachers to be: teachers and affirmers of the greatness of our God.

On the other hand, what does the message of Trinity Sunday have to do with confronting what we might label "the life of empty show"? Much in every way, I would say, in that immersed within the Mystery of the Most Holy Trinity - in God - is where we ultimately want to be or should want to be. The grass whithers, the flower fades, blonds and brunettes all eventually gray, and at certain age, a man has to look into the mirror and see that he's not "cute" anymore. The truth about what it means to live life to the full is not to be found in that "travel channel show" about the Caribbean vacation, eating raw shellfish and dancing until dawn under the coconut palms. As you may have suspected, the boring parts were edited out to give room for the commercials. The fullness of life is Christ in God. Life is as it is perfectly within the Trinity. God-like oneness, the treasuring of the other, the recognition of the other as seen in God's eyes is our goal, our life's project. To the extent that I, as a temple of divine life, can do God's work of renewing the face of the earth by allowing His Light, Life and Love to fill the lives of others, to that extent really I am accomplishing the purpose for which I was created.

The Dewey decimal system put the categories of sports and arts together and rightly so. Youth, health, and appearance are not the be-all and end-all of human existence, however. There are those who achieve on the sports flied or on the stage, in the concert hall, but otherwise live the life of empty show and there are those who are intrigued by them and in some way wish they could or hadn't in some way fallen short of that lifestyle because they didn't practice the flute or haven't the credit line they needed for the plastic surgery and the personal trainer to make it all possible. We would do better if we were to choose God as the light of our lives.

In the lives of some of the saints it is recounted that at the moment of death the scars of their suffering and illness disappeared and the room where they died was filled with a wonderful fragrance. In other words, it is in death that people recognized the beauty and purpose of a life of self-sacrifice and suffering. One of the dimensions of the Feast of the Visitation is recognizing the sanctity of the Blessed Mother in her generosity as a young woman, not dwelling on Gabriel's message for her, but responding to the angel's prompting and hurrying off to be of service to her older cousin Elizabeth. Ultimately, generosity welling up from within us because of the life of God within us should be what we hope and strive for. Both the celibate life and the married life take wings and fly to the extent that they are bound up intimately with the life of the Most Holy Trinity.

Our place really then is hidden and radiant in God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. The flood lights of the stage, the arena or the movie set cast a pale light by comparison with the radiance on the face of Christ shining forth in our daily lives.