Benedictine Sisters of FL

Holy Name Monastery
Founded 1889

God's presence

Everywhere We are In The Presence of God

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Wow!  Talk about conflicts!  Jesus keeps teaching us to love our neighbors as ourselves, love our enemies and do good to those who hate us.  Now he says, “Hate your mother and father, your brother and sister, your wife and children, even your own life.”   Obviously, you cannot have it both ways: Love everybody and hate your family.

Jesus is inviting us to think it over seriously.  Listen to Him: “To be my disciple is unusually difficult. You must make a TOTAL commitment.  Nobody, absolutely nothing, can come before me. I am your one Lord and God. In case of conflict, your nearest and dearest must take second place.”

I share now what Richard Rohr has to say on taking that first step to discipleship: recognize, acknowledge and accept the truth that everywhere and at all times we are in the presence of God.  

We cannot attain the presence of God because we’re already totally in the presence of God. What’s absent is awareness.  Each time you take another breath, realize that God is choosing you again and again—and yet again. We have nothing to work up to or even learn. We do, however, need to unlearn some things, and most especially we must let go of any thought that we have ever been separated from God.

To become aware of God’s presence in our lives, we have to accept what is often difficult.  We have to accept that human culture is in a hypnotic trance. We are sleep-walkers, as St. Paul says “seeing through a glass darkly.”   Wisdom teachers from many traditions have recognized that we human beings do not naturally see; we have to be taught how to see.

That’s what religion is for, to help us let go of illusions and pretenses so we can be more and more present to what actually is. That’s why the Buddha and Jesus both say with one voice, “Be awake.” Jesus talks about “staying watchful.”  And word “Buddha” literally means “I am awake” in Sanskrit. Jesus says further, “If your eye is healthy, your whole body will be full of light.”

We have to learn to see what is already here. Such a simple directive is hard for us to understand. We want to attain some concrete information or achieve an improved morality or learn some behavior that will make us into superior beings. We have a “merit badge” mentality. We worship success. We believe that we get what we deserve, what we work hard for, and what we are worthy of. It’s hard for Western people to think in any other way. But any expectation of merit or reward actually keeps us from the transformative experience called grace.

Experiencing radical grace is like living in a different world. It’s not a world in which I labor to get God to notice me and like me. It’s not a world in which I strive for spiritual success.  Unfortunately, many good people are afraid of gratuity. Instead, we want God for the sake of social order, and we want religion for the sake of social controls. God cannot be seen through such a small and dirty lens.

I suggest that this week we check our spiritual spectacles, clean off any smudges and be open to receiving the radical graces God is waiting to hand us.   The two brief parables in the Gospel (a person constructing a tower and a king marching into battle) make this point obvious – don’t start what you cannot finish.   We must be prepared to accept that discipleship is something we can only commit to if we are prepared to put God before everything else.  Jesus is asking us for TOTAL commitment.

Pray with the Responsorial Psalm: “In every age, O Lord, you have been our refuge; teach us to number our days aright, that we may gain wisdom of heart.  Fill us at daybreak with your kindness that we may shout for joy and gladness all our days.”

 

~by Sister Roberta Bailey, OSB

 

First Reading  Wisdom 9:13-18b      
Second Reading  Plilemon 9-10, 12-17
Gospel Reading  Luke 14: 25-33

 

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An Unspeakable Event

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First Reading  Genesis 12:1-4a               Second Reading 2 Timothy 1:8b-10
Gospel   Matthew 17:1-9

Let’s set the scene: there is a mountain, there must have been clouds since we hear a voice come from out the clouds … then, there is Jesus. Three special friends, a face shining like the sun, clothes dazzling white, a voice from a cloud!   Something powerful is occurring here. And, it’s more than the disciples can comprehend.  They knew Jesus was someone special.  They’d known Him as a teacher, a healer, even a prophet… but that did not capture His full identity. Peter gets it “You are the Christ, the son of the living God!”    But his human understanding did not grasp the full meaning of what he said.

Peter recognizes that Jesus’ dazzling appearance in the presence of Moses and Elijah is significant–“Lord, it is good for us to be here!”   His suggestion to build three booths, or dwelling places sounds like an attempt to capture the moment, to preserve for safekeeping this frightening experience.   Imagine Peter (the extrovert par excellence) , jumping up and down with his hand in the air, like a child desperate to give the right answer, but who cannot quite get it right because he does not fully understand the question.

In his attempt to make sense of the magnificent transformation taking place before his eyes, Peter tries to talk it out, to speak words for the unspeakable event.  While he is still speaking, a bright cloud overshadows all of them and a voice interrupts: “This is my Son, my Beloved; in whom I am well pleased; listen to him.”

A stunned silence follows.  The four-some turns to go back down the mountain.  And Jesus asks them to tell no one what they experienced UNTIL He has been raised from the dead.

There are times when it is best to be quiet.  Times when we are a part of something much bigger than ourselves. There is more going on than what our physical eyes can see or understand. We have entered a mystery that can neither be defined nor discussed, only experienced.

There are moments like that in every life. Lovers gazing at each other see more than just another person. They have been brought face to face with the mystery of love. Parents and grandparents will recall when they beheld for the very first time the new baby in the family.  They see more than a baby. They are face to face with the mystery of life.  We’ve all seen a little child squealing with excitement. It is more than excitement. That child has come face to face with the mystery of deep joy. Recall a time you made a confession, formal or informal, and experienced the forgiveness of God or another person. It was about much more than words, past behavior, and the memory of estrangement. You came face to face with the mystery of grace.  And, many of us have been with a dying confrere, or parent, or friend.  We waited and watched for the person to be carried into new life. We came face to face with the mystery of death.

These are the moments of transfiguration. Each one of them is distinct, unique, and unrepeatable.  Yet they are somehow the same. Each one is so transparent, so real, they glow with the light of God’s presence. They are moments of pure grace. We cannot make them happen. We can only be there when it does happen. Thus, the importance of simply living in the present moment where everything around us seems to fall away.  It is a moment of pure, complete presence.

That is what happened to Peter, James, and John on the mountain.  They “looked up and saw only Jesus.”  This was as much their transfiguration as it was Jesus’. They didn’t just see the light they were absorbed into the light!

Jesus did not become something he was not before that night on the mountain. He was always filled with the glory of God. He didn’t become something new; but the disciples did.  In a flash of insight they saw the world with God’s eyes.  For, you see, transfiguration is not so much about what we see as it is about how we see. As long as we see only with our physical eyes, we will always be looking for something … looking over the fences of our own reality for that greener grass on the other side of the fence.

~ Reflection by Sister Roberta Bailey, OSB, Prioress
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