Culture Archives - Amazing Catechists

Looking for God? Now is the Time.

We have all heard the warning about “living in the past.” It’s not a wise thing to do.

I know that I often catch myself dwelling on this or that decision from years or even decades ago. When this happens I find myself rehashing my reasons and rationales like some broken record.

There is no doubt that 20/20 hindsight can be a cruel partner, poking us every now and then. Armed with the clarity of knowing results and consequences we torture ourselves wondering how we could not see the results of our actions or decisions way back when.

Not to be outdone, of course, are the ever-popular apprehensions about the future. After all, is not the future merely a blind curve teeming with unexpected traps and problems? Yet we rush toward manholes and cliffs we will not see until it is too late.

Between the haunting past and the foreboding future, we have a ready-made plate of worries and ruminations at our disposal. What we need to realize sooner better than later, however, is that God is neither in our rear-view mirror nor is He at the end of the blind curve that is our future.

Dwelling In The Past

There is a clear distinction between dwelling in the past as opposed to learning from the past. The word “dwelling” means a home or where one resides or lives. It is not constructive, and it’s even destructive, to constantly live in the past.

Whether we constantly reflect on positive or negative memories and experiences, the mere fact that we keep re-visiting that past takes away from our focus on the present. Spending all day thinking about my great high school experiences does little to improve my present situation. Likewise, obsessing over the mistakes or poor choices I made in the past only tends to beat me down.

Of course there is nothing wrong with mentally glancing back at our past highlights or low points. The problem occurs when we dwell or entrench ourselves in a time which we cannot change now. We gain nothing, and even retreat, when we define ourselves by our past, bad or good. When we define ourselves by our past, we perpetuate that past far beyond its beneficial role in our lives. The past should inform, and not define, our present and future.

Learning From The Past

God wants us to learn and grow toward our destiny with Him. But we cannot learn and grow if we wrap ourselves in our past. Obsessing over past glory only invites complacency, presumption, stagnation, or even arrogance. Obsessing over past stumbles or hurts only brings depression, resentment, regret, and even bitterness. No matter how you look at it, the past that is obsessed over is a moral minefield most mortal humans cannot traverse safely.

We should use the past as a teacher for enhancing our future. The only thing worse than a mistake is a mistake one does not learn from and may even repeat. Reflecting on past errors and taking steps to avoid those errors again is never a bad thing. When we reflect on our past mistakes, we bring the wisdom of the past to our present. When we dwell on the past, however, we drag our present to that past.

The Past is an Unhealthy Neighborhood

The past can be dangerous turf teeming with regret, remorse, resentment, revenge, bitterness, and ingratitude. Armed with 20/20 hindsight, we see results and consequences that we could never have anticipated back then. Obsessing over what we should or could have done or what we did not do goes way past the productive stage.

Forgiving others or ourselves can be very difficult, if not impossible, for those wrapped in the past. It is also practically impossible to appreciate the present if we are preoccupied with the past. The devil wants us to sink in the past’s cesspool of vice and hopelessness.

Ultimately, those mired in the past cannot let go because they cannot trust in God’s mercy.

Leave The Future to God

Dwelling in the past is an invitation to be ungrateful for what we have and mistrustful of God’s Divine Mercy. At the same time, worrying about the future can be an invitation to be mistrustful of God’s Divine Providence.

While there is nothing wrong with glancing at our future and reflecting on our plans and hopes, this is very different from being anxious or even petrified of what that future will bring. If the past is teeming with the potential for regret, then the future is overflowing with the potential for fear.

God wants us to learn from our past and plan for our future with joyful trust, acceptance, and gratitude for His many blessings. We are closest to God when we humbly ask for forgiveness for our stumbles and humbly embrace God’s Will for our lives. Learn from your past and leave it to God. Embrace your future and entrust it to God as well.

“Do not worry about tomorrow; tomorrow will take care of itself.” (Mt 6:34)

Find God in The Present

Fulton Sheen once observed that much of our unhappiness stems from excessive concentration in the past and extreme preoccupation with the future. We cannot change the past. We only have the potential to either simmer in it or learn from it. Similarly, we cannot predict the future. We only have the opportunity to become paralyzed before it or to embrace it by trusting in God.

God is found in our present moments. He is present among the countless souls we daily encounter in great need for kindness, compassion, and love. He is present in the wonders of nature that surround us each today. Each moment is an opportunity to get closer to God in small and immense ways. We can only relieve pain, loneliness, hopelessness, and sorrow in the present. We can only reach out to wandering hands in search of a caring touch in the present.

Prayers about the past tend to apologize or hope. Prayers about the future tend to petition. Prayers in the present, however, are the most opportune way to praise and thank the Creator.

Embrace each moment as an opportunity for salvation. Sanctify each moment with humble contentment and acceptance. Do not waste or tarnish each moment with apathy, or ingratitude. Let God always be your answer to now.

2020 Gabriel Garnica

Following Christ is a Series of Commitments

By Gabe Garnica

In the Gospel reading for Sept. 8, Jesus tells us that truly following Him requires a series of continuous commitments. But for many, such commitments are simply a bridge too far.

The commitments Jesus lists include “hating” our family, bearing our cross, and planning our path (LK 14:25-33). Christ is telling us that following Him requires sacrifice, suffering, dedication, commitment, dedication, and planning. This teaching ties back to previous readings where Jesus tells us we need to be humble (LK 14:7-14) and that we should strive to enter the kingdom through the narrow door (LK 13:22-30).

Following Christ

Many people are ‘turned off’ by the word “hate” in this reading. But as Msgr. Charles Pope explains, “The use of the word “hate” here does not mean that we are to have contempt for others or to nourish unrighteous anger toward them. Rather, this is a Jewish idiom. For some reason, the Hebrew language has very few comparative words such as more/less and greater/ fewer . . . So, what Jesus means is that we cannot prefer anyone or anything to Him.”

Our Lord was merely telling us that following Him must be our primary mission in this life, above all other commitments and missions. The ironic part of this concern is that the word “hate” is one of a litany of words so thrown about in our modern speech that it has somehow undergone a diabolic distortion.

Today this word is often used as a weapon of political, social, and media manipulation. If an opponent does not agree with us, we call them a hater. If anyone dares to express reservations regarding others’ actions and attitudes, we call them a hater. Pretty soon, we will resort to calling anyone who gets in our nerves a hater. In this superficial and often lazy society, the mainstream media has taken over the mantle of description and perception of reality. Whomever the media calls a hater is, in fact, a hater. No further explanation or justification necessary!

Some ‘Hatred’ is Actually Required

In truth, to hold Christ above everything else in our lives, we must develop a hatred, an aversion, or at least a disregard for anything and anyone who dares to stand in our way toward Christ. That of course includes sin but, beyond that, it includes not allowing the ingredients of sin to fester in our daily lives. Things such as resentment, bitterness, revenge, lust, and jealousy, for example, cannot be allowed to become squatters in our hearts, minds, and souls lest they become permanent squatters and, eventually, possessors of who we are.

Any strong feeling toward someone or something implies a passion or a love for that person or thing. Likewise, any strong aversion or hatred for someone or something implies a total distaste and a commitment to avoid and distance ourselves from that person or thing. Unless we find sin, toxic things, and toxic people revolting, we will leave ourselves vulnerable to those very sins, things, and people. Ultimately, unless someone or something brings us closer to Christ, we must push that person or thing away on our journey and mission to help ourselves and others toward Christ.

Following Christ is About Genuine Sacrifice

While we have all heard that we carry our crosses in order to follow Christ, many of us brush this challenge off. We have not seen too many folks hanging from crosses in our neighborhoods lately. We think of crucifixion as an ancient and primitive torture and punishment. So we do not take it too seriously in our so-called enlightened world. We do, however, understand that carrying our crosses means being willing to suffer and sacrifice. But many of us now equate this with not eating chocolate during Lent.

In truth, the level and kind of sacrifice and suffering that we must equate with carrying our cross has never been watered down since Calvary. What has often been diluted, however, is our perception of what that cross actually means. This is not about sacrificing chocolate or high fat diets. It is about pushing away the false values and superficial concerns of this world. It is about placing Christ above anything this world promises and, in fact, above ourselves and our own personal agenda.

Following Christ Cannot Be an Accident

This reading also reminds us that following Christ cannot be an accident or a coincidence. Being a follower of Christ is a serious and profound commitment. We cannot possibly turn that dedication into a whimsical fancy to be followed only on odd days or whenever we are in the mood.

Our Lord compares this to building a serious structure or responding to a serious military situation. If we seriously want to build something of value or be a soldier for any worthwhile cause, we do some serious planning. Then we must dedicate ourselves to that which we plan to build or fight for.

We must also note that this building and fighting does not, however, imply random, headstrong, or mindless full-speed-ahead thinking. We must be willing to take a step back, to pause, to assess our strengths and weaknesses, and to adjust our original plans. Temporary retreat is often the best response to immediate obstacles and setbacks if one is to obtain ultimate, long-term success.

Failure to Plan

In truth, sin is the result of accidental thinking. When we do not plan, we fail to prepare. We fall to the whims of human weakness and nature. In our quest for Christ it can truly be said that if we fail to prepare, we prepare to fail.

If we consider the temporary shine of sin threatening our eternal salvation, we begin to get a sense of just how foolish and mindless sin really is. Assuming that we actually care and want to save our souls, then it makes absolutely no sense to lose that treasure by committing any sin. Yet we do it every day.

Sin is the epitome of foolishness and of stupidity. Yet we engage in such stupidity all the time. Are we, in fact, stupid? No, we are just weak;. And that weakness causes us to accidentally slip into the utter failure of sin.

My meaning here is that God has given each of us enough intelligence and common sense to realize that sin is the ultimate stupidity. However, He has also given us freedom of choice. So too often we choose to be stupid and vulnerable to our own human weakness.

If we would approach every day like an intelligent and careful builder or a general constructing our path to Christ and confronting the forces that pull us away from Him, our God-given gifts would put us on the path to eternal salvation. Sadly, we tend to stumble through each day, oblivious to the forces that threaten us. And we inadvertently build our eternal resume on flimsy ground.

Christ’s Lesson

Ultimately, if we do not put Christ above everyone and everything else, we are putting ourselves above Christ. If we are not willing to fully sacrifice and suffer for Christ, we are also putting ourselves above Christ. All sin is about putting ourselves above Christ. If we fail to plan and prepare to do what we have to do to follow Christ and serve God with our God-given gifts, we are again putting ourselves above Christ.

Given all of this, this Gospel reading is really telling us that reaching eternal salvation means putting away our mirrors and stopping our fascination with ourselves above Christ. Following Christ is about keeping our eyes on the prize and that prize is not a selfie.

What is Your Eternal Job Description? The Lesson of Martha and Mary

By Gabe Garnica

The recent gospel story of Martha and Mary (LK 10: 38-42) is one of the most powerful and profound expressions of an eternal struggle many of us face on a daily basis. People grapple with their ‘job descriptions’ every single day, just like Martha was doing.

Quite often our job description is about as secular as it can get. We focus on what we need to focus on to succeed in this world. The next day, however, we sway toward a crooked, but hopefully sincere, struggle to define our ‘eternal’ job as saving our own souls and those of others while serving and loving God and others.

While a certain amount of shuffling between a secular and our sacred, eternal job description is allowed in our daily pilgrimage through this world toward God, we must always take stock and adjust. We need to maintain the overall direction of our efforts – facing due Heaven and not due earth. What are the signs that we are straying toward earth more than toward Heaven in this daily struggle?

Burdens

In Luke’s gospel, Martha feels burdened by her earthly tasks and complains to Our Lord. Whatever earthly loads we may be carrying, feeling burdened certainly seems par for the course regarding all of them. Earthly tasks carry physical, emotional, psychological, social, financial, practical, and many other kinds of burdens. As physical beings, we will certainly feel those burdens on a regular basis.

Our burdens can surely tire, frustrate, and exasperate us. While it is both normal and expected that we will all feel these strains from time to time, there is a high correlation between our eternal job description and just how much and how regularly we are feeling such burdens. Those with an earthly focus will tend to feel more and increasingly burdened by these loads because earthly burdens tend to seem all-consuming and endless.

In fact, earthy burdens sometimes seem insurmountable and pointless. They can overwhelm us. We can feel lost as to how to handle them, and wonder how they can possibly lead us to any good. A couple consumed and obsessed with buying a home, for example, may pull themselves in all directions trying to save for their goal. They can even lose hope that they will ever achieve it in the light of their difficulties.

Isolation and Abandonment

Martha also expressed resentment that Our Lord did not care about her plight. Martha felt she was being left all alone to deal with her burden. Once we become distracted or lost in an earthly focus, however, we measure and judge according to the dictates and standards of this world and not of God. Negative, earthly feelings such as resentment, anger, bitterness, and jealousy creep in. These secular standards and measures tell us that we are getting the short end of the stick and even being treated unfairly by God and others. Ironically, we will feel isolated and abandoned by God and others precisely because our self-obsession and warped self-pity will not allow us to find fulfillment or joy in focusing on the needs of others.

It is easy to see that Martha was only focused on herself in this situation. She was feeling unfairly treated and did not care to see anything other than that view of the situation. Martha even went as far as to judge and question Our Lord’s stance in all of this! Do we not do the same when we pray for something and then resent it when we feel our prayers are not answered?

Enticing Others to Our Mistake

Martha’s resentment and frustration led her to ask Our Lord to make Mary join her in her mistake! I have often read that one of the devil’s greatest delights in pushing us to sin is successfully convincing us to join in his mistake of rejecting God. Misery loves company, and Martha’s self-obsession leads her to demand that Our Lord order Mary to make the same mistake that she has made. This warped delusion of self and righteousness goes as far as pretending that one’s foolishness is actually one’s enlightenment and that others should follow one’s “light.”

Our Lord tells Martha that she is worried and anxious about pointless things that will not ultimately amount to a hill of beans to her eternity. We stray from the path to Our Lord to the extent that we seek our treasure among things that do not lead us to him. Washing dishes and making beds are not inherent evils. Fixing the car and installing a new garage door opener are not inherently bad. Fixing the air conditioning and paying our bills are not superficial and useless tasks. However, while we should focus on and accomplish these things as we can, we must never reach the point of worrying and obsessing over these tasks and duties as if they are all that matters. Such worry and obsession only pushes God to the background for another day.

Where is God to You?

When we become fixated with things of this world over what matters to heaven, we tend to push heaven to the background and even change how, and even if, we see God at all. If you see God as some sugar daddy who will come to your rescue whenever you need Him, you have lost the proper place of God in your life. Frankly, I am not sure which is worse: forgetting God or distorting what God is. If God is not found in your preoccupation or consideration of some issue or burden, then perhaps you are mired in an overly earthly focus.

The story of Martha and Mary reminds us that we have a daily choice to embrace God or this earth. Too many times, we become so wrapped up in accomplishing what this world expects or even what we think this world expects that we forget what God expects from us. While doing our best to fulfill our tasks and duties in this world is important, we can never allow those tasks and duties to displace God as the center of our lives and focus.

Always place God first, place your earthly burdens before Him, and trust that He will guide you through these struggles!

2019 Gabriel Garnica

Are You a Yada Yada Catholic?

By Gabe Garnica

The phrase Yada yada has been around for a long time, with varied origins proposed, but the phrase’s popularity was re-ignited by a 1997 episode of the Seinfeld sitcom. The double use of yadda implies a shorthand way of fast-forwarding boring or expected parts of life or speech. It is literally the equivalent of et cetera or blah blah.

For example, a student might tell her absent classmate, “The professor did her usual lecture on the scientific method, yada yada, and then she cancelled class early.” The implication is that the yada yadapart is the usual, mundane, unimportant, and/or redundant stuff already experienced by the parties involved. The idea is that such parts are so predictable that repeating them is a waste of time since people could figure out what was implied anyway.

Part of the irony and attempt at humor was that one party thought that Yada yada was appropriate, practical, and self-explanatory in a given context and the other party was only further confused by the phrase. Rather than save everyone a lot of thought, the phrase only threw the confused party into a sea of unanswered questions and unsure assumptions. A life immersed only in the secular can often be a paradox of such ironic tragedy in the midst of patronizing presumption. Such a life is pulled between satisfying flimsy and changing societal conventions and trying to grasp effective and fulfilling self-perceptions. We are often pulled between satisfying others and ourselves by a society that idolizes popularity and self at the same time. Like the townspeople pretending that the naked Emperor is wearing clothes, we are often too obsessed with looking right to do what is truly right.

Yada Yada Catholics

I am fairly certain that this might be the first use of Yada yada to describe Catholics, so embrace my pioneering spirit. As I see it, many of us might be tempted to fast-forward, assume, practicalize, and short-hand our Faith. Why would we do this? Perhaps, whether we admit it or not, we have allowed our Faith, or at least our perception and experience of it, to grow stale, mundane, predictable, and even boring. We have lost the transcendent power and meaning of our beliefs and practices to the point where we now see the practice of our faith as nothing more than commercials we want to fast-forward through on the DVR of our lives. This tragedy explains parents missing mass with their kids in order to take them to swim meets and soccer games. It explains folks treating the most Blessed Sacrament as nothing more than a weekly white cookie. It explains hordes of Catholics too ignorant about what their Faith is about to explain much less defend it.

The Five Culprits of Catholic Yada Yada

I believe that there are many reasons for Catholic Yada yada, but the five main ones are, in no particular order: 1) Ignorance 2) Distraction 3) Arrogance 4) Defiance and 5) Distance.

Thanks to a diluted and sometimes distorted religious education system, many Catholics have been raised increasingly ignorant of core Catholic beliefs and the relative importance and centrality of those beliefs. Many Catholics, for example, do not know, understand, or care about the Divine Presence.

Secondly, modern society embodies so many distractions, from technology to twisted values, that many Catholics are easily confused and readily blend truth with subjective whim and myth. Third and fourth, current social values promote and foment rampant personal arrogance and defiance against any absolute moral code. Morality is what each person defines as morality. Anyone who even attempts to guide others toward ethical behavior is labeled an intolerant and divisive threat to society. It is troubling that increasing numbers of Catholics stubbornly and cluelessly latch unto distorted, warped, and very subjective interpretations and applications of their Faith.

We see scores of Catholics encouraged and convinced that attending a wedding between two divorced Catholics without annulments is acceptable to “maintain the peace” and exhibit “love and acceptance”. Finally, all of these things and more cause many Catholics to grow distant from their faith. Their beliefs become nothing more than distant relatives they admit to being related to but barely know. All too often, many Catholics become Peter at the fire warming himself while Christ, their Faith, is interrogated. We too may deny Christ many times through our words, actions, and omissions merely to avoid trouble and criticism.

The Surprising Meaning of Yada and Its Implications

The most surprising part of my preparation for this piece was the discovery that a single Yada is a Hebraic word meaning a knowing dedication and sharing often based on love, mercy, and justice which is often referenced in the Old Testament. The obvious question is how can such a beautiful and positive word suddenly become so negative and dismissive when doubled? I think that the answer may lie in the idea that we often take what is most important for granted out of convenience, impatience, and a warped search for what I will call external novelty.

The process by which this terrible thing happens might begin with expecting core, profound, and central ideas to continually inspire and radiate their own wonder. Rather than embracing our responsibility to cultivate and refresh the wonder of the most transcendent, we tend to sit back and expect the transcendent to entertain and inspire us. It is almost as if we have come to equate greatness with the innate ability to generate greatness without any effort or participation on our part. A fantastic health speaker may provide us with a wonderful diet and exercise strategies, but our health will not improve unless we take, apply, and make those ideas work in our lives. Similarly, we are the hands of Christ in this world, not merely his audience eating popcorn and waiting for the next miracle or magic trick.

We tend to exhibit the obnoxious trio of lazy impatience leading to an obsession with finding the most convenient path to anything. In our rush to get to the next great thing which is often not that great at all, we tend to overlook the very greatness right under our noses. Ultimately, we seek external novelty, automatically assuming that new is better and new must come from outside of what is presently before us. In this context, the Hebraic Yada’s power and beauty are dismissed when we lump all of the Yadas in our lives into a convenient pile while impatiently looking elsewhere for the freshness and wonder we already have before us if we only care to look. Many Catholics, for example, are too distracted with the cares of the day to truly consider the majesty of the Divine Presence. Similarly, many folks go the bathroom exactly during the elevation of the Eucharist at the Offertory. Lastly, how many Catholics truly consider that we are just as present at the Last Supper, Passion, Death, and Resurrection of our Lord as the Apostles were when we attend mass? For far too many Catholics, the Holy Mass has conveniently become a weekly social ritual.

One Yada is Enough

Given what we know about the meanings of Yada as opposed to Yada yada, we can perhaps conclude that one Yada is more than enough when it comes to our Faith. We must see our Faith as a knowing dedication to Christ and sharing of that dedication with others in love, mercy, and justice. That view, however, invites us to continually seek the internal novelty of ways by which we may practice and apply such dedication, sharing, love, mercy, and justice. The answer does not lie in the society and world around us, for to believe so would imply that the value of our Faith is dependent upon this world and its values. Rather, the beauty and power of our faith are to be found within the Faith itself and our ability to discover, extract, and apply what we find to a needy world. We cannot be lazy observers of our own Faith merely waiting to be entertained while continually handcuffing our beliefs to the whimsical chains of this world. Rather, it is our duty, mission, and purpose to draw out from our Faith the necessary tools to both glorify God and bring Christ to everyone we meet.

One Yada is enough because one Yada tells us all we need to know and use to follow Christ. Once we let this world convince us that it has the prescription to improve our Faith, we will become Yada yadaCatholics who think that convenience, entertainment, external novelty, and compromise will ever bring us closer to our Faith much less to Christ. The internal novelty of our Faith is simply its transcendent ability to provide us with new insights and applications through Christ and his example. By necessity, any external novelty will be subject to the superficial and distorted values of this world. Ultimately, when it comes to the Yada in our Faith, less is more!

2019 Gabriel Garnica

My Way is Not Always The Answer

By Gabe Garnica

I Did It My Way…..

We all know the story of how Abraham and his wife Sarah tried to sidestep God’s promise that they would have a child despite their old age ( Gen 16:1-16). Rather than trusting and waiting on God to fulfill His promise, these two used her maid Hagar to result in that long-awaited child only to end up with family jealousy and turmoil that still rages today through their descendants.

This initial story of a fall reminds us of a very familiar human tactic with God. We ask Him for something and then set a subconscious, unstated deadline on that request. This time limit may not be express or concrete as in a certain date, but it will at least be an openness to finding some sort of shortcut to our desired goal. We ask God to find us a mate and then go on 45 online dating sites to sift through pathetic examples of potential mates which will either lead nowhere or, worse, somewhere worse than where we are now.

Others will ask God for a job and grab a job God clearly would not want them to have. Still other folks will pray for something and then grow impatient and even bitter when the desired result does not come. I have often been guilty of this, using my supposed petition more as a purchase order than a humble request from a Creator to Whom I owe everything I have and am already. Therein lies the core problem: we should spend most of our day thanking this wonderful, generous, and loving God who invites us to trust and love Him enough to ask for more. However, our weak and defective humanity leads us to go overboard and either ask for too much or, just as bad, please-mand, which is my new word meaning demand with a please on top.

Abraham and Sarah were so wrapped up in what they wanted, what they probably felt that they deserved, that they did not stop to consider what God wanted and deserved from them: simple faith and patience. All too often, we sing Frank Sinatra’s hit My Way, proud to have handled things our way on our time and on our terms. However, is that what God deserves from us?

Close Your Human Eyes and Practice Blind Faith

As defective people moving in a defective world, we need to close our eyes from time to time and ask ourselves who or what our daily GPS is or should be. All too often, we will find that expediency and practicality often push us to find our own way on our terms without even asking God to chime in. We will fool ourselves into pretending that we are doing a very busy God a solid by handling things ourselves. After all, how sick of you would your plumber be if you called him every single time your sink was slow?

The truth is, God wants us to be assertive and independent in many ways, for that is how we will grow as human beings. However, God’s definition of those traits does not include brushing Him off like some meddling uncle. Our Lord wants us to always have Him on speed dial when we need Him. It never hurts to ask for God’s help and give God time to respond, His way. That is not to say that we will foolishly wait four decades for something we need to decide soon. What it does say is that we should give God a reasonable time to respond. That response by the way, may be no response, which may still be a response on God’s terms. Begin with the conviction that God knows what is best for us and run with that. Abraham and Sarah did not do that above; they gave God the keys and then used a brick to open things their way.

The Gideon Pill

I refer to the Gideon Pill as God’s way of showing us who is boss. He will wait beyond our patience or beneath our means to accomplish miracles, just so we know who performed those miracles. The Israelites had to wander in the desert forty years before entering the Promised Land due to their disobedience and lack of faith. God waited until there was no doubt He was doing the work for them and until He had stamped out the last of the disobedient doubters (Num 14: 1-21).

One of my favorite Bible stories is that of Gideon; a military leader, judge, and prophet chosen by God to defeat the Midianites and avoid slavery for his people. God reduced Gideon’s army to 300 men against a vast enemy in order to leave no doubt who was responsible for the victory( Judg 7:2-8). We all need the Gideon Pill from time to time, being put in situations where seemingly God is the only way out just so we can grow in faith, appreciation, and obedience to such a wonderful God.

Abraham’s Recovery

An even more famous story than those noted above is Abraham’s great response of obedience to God’s request that Abraham sacrifice his only son Isaac ( Gen 22: 16-18). God knew how much Abraham waited for and loved his son, so He put Abraham to the test of sacrificing everything for God which, of course, Abraham passed with flying colors. Abraham had learned his lesson from the Hagar mistake. He knew that loving and trusting God is not something you dip your toe in. You are either all in or you should get out. Nothing of this world is worth losing God.

Conclusion

This world tells us to show off and prove we can handle everything ourselves. Certainly, one of the signs of maturity is the greater ability to be independent and self-reliant. However, regardless of our age, we all need God at all times and need to remember that. Like Abraham and Sarah, we sometimes think we know all the answer but, like Gideon, we all learn soon enough that God is pulling all the strings one way or the other.

This world tempts us to run everything in our lives our way, on our time, on our terms. What we need to avoid, however, is that we are not running away from God in the process.

2019 Gabriel Garnica

The Silence of Christmas Speaks Loud and Clear

By Gabe Garnica

In his wonderful book, The Power of Silence: Against The Dictatorship of Noise, Cardinal Robert Sarah tells us

Without silence, God disappears in the noise. And this noise becomes all the more obsessive because God is absent. Unless the world rediscovers silence, it is lost.

We might rightly ask, what does Cardinal Sarah mean by silence and noise? The answer, my friends, is all around us right now. Cardinal Sarah refers to silence as that environment by which we can encounter God, Who is Divine Silence. Only by placing ourselves in the silence that is God can we ever hope to hear Him in our hearts, minds, and souls. I was once told that God always answers our prayers but that we often are not listening or do not want to listen to His answer.

If God is true silence, then what is this noise that we speak of? Is it the sirens and whistles that invade our daily lives? Is it the clamoring of crowds and busy streets? Is it the blare of alarm clocks and bells that dictate our hypnotizing routine toward ends we may no longer even know?

For Cardinal Sarah, noise is anything which distracts us from God, and so that kind of noise is far beyond the sounds that disrupt our quiet moments of meditation and reflection. We all have our favorite sounds and songs. Some love a bubbling brook or birds chirping. Others enjoy the sounds of a forest or soft background music. Ultimately, inevitably, sounds surround us with such frequency and intensity that we become oblivious to their power over us. The loud sounds of a factory or office fade into the distance the longer one works in those environments. Eventually, we internalize those sounds so that they become part of who we are and, for that matter, part of who we become to others. If we allow this world to become our priority, we will invariably allow the sounds of this world to become the background music of that priority.

Faced with such variety of sounds, we indirectly choose which will become noise and which will remain simply sounds. Sounds are those things that we hear through our ears, but noises are those sounds that we hear through our minds, hearts, and souls which distract and even distance us from God. Most people will agree that alarm bells, whistles, busy streets, and bustling workplaces by themselves do not really distract us from God. I do not necessarily distance myself from God when I hear an alarm clock or enter a busy office.

So when do sounds become noise for us? For many of us, a sound becomes a noise when it is annoying, unpleasant, unwanted, or distracting, and that is a valid, earthly view of noise. Earthly noise inspires us to escape, avoid, or distance ourselves from the source of that noise. Listening to songs or music that we do not like is often noise to us because we do not find these pleasant or to our liking. In fact, things we do not understand, care about, or relate to often become simply noise to us.

However, for Cardinal Sarah, the worst kind of noise is that which pushes us away from God and what God is about. This noise is contradictory to the love and essence of what God truly is. The silence of God is not found in criticism, judgment of others, gossip, vulgarity, arrogance, or mockery. Neither is this divine silence found in idle, useless talk about superficial things.

As we proceed through our yearly Christmas journey, we may ask ourselves if this journey has become a mundane routine, a robotic ritual, or a remote control duty to fulfill. Do we do Christmas or do we truly experience its essence? Do we treat Christmas like some shopping list to finish or do we embrace Christmas as a beautifully profound opportunity to re-connect with what really matters?

There is nothing inherently wrong with Christmas music, shopping, decorations, parties, family gatherings, and all of the exciting preparations we make each year as long as we do not allow these things to define Christmas for us and therefore distance us from God. The sounds of Christmas become the noise of Christmas to the extent that we forget Christ as a result. There was a time when celebrating Christmas and getting closer to God went hand and hand. That time is past and lost. We are surrounded by a word and society immersed in very temporary, superficial, distracting, and even destructive spiritual noise. We live in a world which no longer inspires us toward God but, sadly, seems to make every effort to drag us away from Him. Whether this world succeeds in that effort is up to each of us.

God is Divine Silence, but He speaks to each of us loud and clear if we are willing to listen. We encounter Him in our prayer, in our kindness and love toward others, and in the eyes of the fragile elderly, frightened sick, confused young, and marginalized homeless. If we engage in the daily struggle to push away this world’s noise and simply listen to God’s divine, not-so-silent call, we can encounter the child Jesus on that silent night each and every day of the year.

2018 Gabriel Garnica

5 Ways to Wait with Purpose

By Jeannie Ewing

Advent is a perfect liturgical season to apply what we have learned and understand about the spirituality of waiting – its purpose and gift for us from God. Because taking a lofty spiritual concept can be difficult to break down in terms of practical application to everyday living, it’s important to understand particular steps that can assist us in using our seasons of waiting with intention.

This Advent, try to be sincere in your effort to wait with purpose. Turn to God with these five ways of entering into dialogue with him as only a guideline to understand more deeply what he is asking of you or telling you in your time of waiting.

A brief preface of these five steps is this: You may enter into the first few cyclically for months or even years before you reach the prepare phase. This is because preparation often requires a very refined and fine-tuned faith in which God will chisel and prune you in order to move you closer to a specific call or mission.

Listen

We can never expect to glean clarity in our uncertainty or holy tension if we don’t regularly enter into the sanctuary of our own hearts, nestled in silence. Solitude is absolutely imperative for us to hear God speak to our hearts.

Though it’s difficult to do in my current state as a wife and mother to three young daughters, I create a sacred space every day to enter into the heart of God through silence. This is how I begin my daily prayers and devotions. I gather my prayer journal, daily inspirational flip calendar, liturgical companion Magnificat, and seasonal devotions, if applicable. Then I breathe and gaze at an image of the Sacred Heart of Jesus mounted above our holy water font in the living room.

Listening means we turn our ears toward another. We must eliminate every distraction possible if we are to effectively hear that “still, small voice” within.

Ponder

Sometimes God is silent when we seek him in solitude, but there are occasions when he will give you a bold message. Prepare yourself for all sorts of surprises led by the Holy Spirit! When you read Scripture, and a particular word or phrase or passage really jolts or sears your heart, pay attention. Write it down and mull it over for a few moments.

Ask some questions about it. For example, while I was writing Waiting with Purpose, the words “wait” or “be still” or “trust in the Lord” came to me frequently during the listening and pondering stages of prayer. I kept asking God what he wanted to teach me and wrote down the thoughts that inspired the book.

Pray

After you formulate some questions, bring them directly to the Lord in conversation. Pour your heart out to him – your fears and doubts, your anxiety or concerns, your excitement or restlessness. Give him everything that flows forth as you delve more deeply into your own heart in search of his.

You are conversing with the Divine, so there’s no need for format or formulae here. It’s just your heart language speaking to God’s heart.

This stage will likely lead you back to listening, pondering, asking more questions, and praying again. You will likely engage in this process for quite some time before advancing to the last two.

Prepare

Over time, you might discern that God is asking something specific of you. Everyone’s mission will look different, of course. But the point is that you receive a divine assignment, based on the pattern of listening to and speaking with God.

If and when this happens, you will need to find a good spiritual director if you haven’t already. This person needs to be objective in matters of guiding you more deeply into accepting your holy assignment and discovering what that means. Think of St. Teresa of Calcutta whom Jesus asked to found an order serving the “poorest of the poor.” Or St. Teresa of Avila who heard the Lord tell her to reform the Carmelite order.

God asks some people today to become overseas missionaries, write books, enter into a specific vocation, found a non-profit, lead a parish ministry, and so on. Regardless of the assignment, know that he has something specific in mind for you. Be attentive and vigilant like the wise virgins who kept their oil ready for the Bridegroom’s arrival.

Act

Again, you will need a spiritual director to guide you before you actually go forth to begin your mission or ministry. The point is to be ready for whatever God asks of you. It seems as if waiting lingers forever, but once God acts in your life, he moves quickly. This isn’t always the case, but you will find that timing is such an important piece to your waiting experience.

This post is an abridged version of Chapter 6 in my book, Waiting with Purpose: Persevering When God Says “Not Yet.”

Passive Waiting and Suffering Well

By Jeannie Ewing

We established that no one likes to wait and that a small fraction of our waiting experiences is what we term active, or Advent waiting. What, then, comprises the majority of those periods of life when we linger in tension, when we are in between or feeling stuck or lost?

Passive waiting is when we move from a place of knowing specifically that God will complete some good work He has begun in us to becoming entirely unaware and uncertain of what He is doing or asking of us. We move from subject to object in passive waiting. For example, if you are late to work and get stuck in the midst of unexpected construction, you are experiencing passive waiting. If you just had a biopsy and have to spent an agonizing week not knowing if you have cancer or not, you are in passive waiting.

These times when waiting is painful, when we do not choose to suffer, is precisely what makes life worthwhile. It’s not because of the suffering itself; it is because of what Passion gives birth to, that is, Resurrection. We know that suffering is not the end and that our tragedies can bring about beautiful blessings. But how do we understand passive waiting so that we can learn to suffer well, or at least better?

The Gift of Helplessness and Dependency

Maybe you or someone you know has recently become injured or suffered an accident that left him/her incapacitated. Maybe you have fallen ill with a terrible malady and simply cannot keep up your active lifestyle anymore. Maybe you are disabled.

These are all examples of the helpless state, whether temporary or permanent. And when we can’t move around like we’re used to – going to work, doing household chores, taking care of our families – we feel guilty, as if we are a burden. But God shows us the hidden gift of helplessness, because He deliberately sent His Son as an infant totally dependent on His Mother’s love and nourishment:

The popular imagination discerns nothing in God: no dependence, no waiting, no exposure, nothing of passion or passibility…and therefore, when these conditions appear in the life of man, they must appear fundamentally ‘ungodlike;’ and therefore again they must appear alien to the proper status of man and unworthy of his unique dignity. (W.H. Vanstone quote from Waiting with Purpose, p. 87)

So when you find yourself in a helpless state, know that you are not alone and that God longs to reach you in your suffering.

Preparing for Mission

When we suffer, we gain wisdom and life experience that cannot be replicated by books or rhetoric. Our experiences, then, shape us fundamentally. They make us stronger, more compassionate, and resilient. Even more, they lead us to mission.

You probably didn’t ask for your sickness or your child’s disability or your spouse’s Alzheimer’s. You didn’t want to lose a friend to addiction or a parent to cancer. Yet all of these atrocities can lead us to accompany others who are suffering similar afflictions. We are more equipped to handle their pain when we have already been through our own journey of grief.

Entering Your Resurrection

I learned something extraordinary while researching my book, Waiting with Purpose: all of the Greek verbs used to describe Jesus’ life and ministry were in the active tense until He was handed over in the Garden of Gethsemane. He spoke to His apostles at the Last Supper, “My work is finished” but immediately before expiring, “It is finished.” These are powerful examples of how working isn’t the be-all-end-all to life’s meaning and value.

Your true work is to suffer with Jesus and learn to suffer well. This doesn’t mean perfectly – just well. That means you will have moments when offering up your pain in solidarity with Jesus’ or someone else’s pain is effortless and other times when it’s impossible. The point is to keep moving forward in your own passion, knowing with confidence that your own Calvary journey will lead you to new life in Resurrection, whether in this life or the next.

This post was adapted from Chapter 6 in my book, Waiting with Purpose: Persevering When God Says “Not Yet.”

Interview With Catholic Speaker, Hudson Byblow

By Lisa Mladinich

Lisa: Hudson, you’ve done wonderful work promoting the need for all people to grow in virtue, rather than falling for the culture’s increasingly bizarre and limiting sexuality labels. Your new Lighthouse CD, titled, In Pursuit of My Identity: Homosexuality, Transgenderism, and My Life, is terrific!

What would you say are the most important facts for people to ponder about human sexuality—specifically regarding same-sex-attractions and gender identity —at this stage in our history as Catholics?

Hudson: All glory be to God. Aside from learning how to be present with a person in a pastoral moment, there is also the aspect of educating the people within our church overall. This is important because we all contribute to the overall environment that people grow into. Education on any topic typically includes an enhanced understanding of language, and on this topic, that is no exception. Needless to say, there is a lot of work to be done. After all, we could never expect to fully understand the meaning of a song if we didn’t know the lyrics, so it would only make sense that we at least try to understand the lyrics to the “song of the Church” in a more profound way as well.

The Nuances

First, I think it would help if we examined linguistic nuances pertaining to attractions/inclinations. For example, if we speak about attractions/inclinations as something people experience instead of something people have, we introduce the nuance of non-permanence. For many people, becoming aware of that nuance can be life-changing. It helps them understand that they are not necessarily destined to experience those attractions/inclinations forever. Though the attractions/inclinations a person experiences might not transform over time, a sense of impermanence can definitely shift their expectations of themselves, and that shift matters because it impacts how a person chooses to live. Note that none of what I said has anything to do with the objective of “changing from gay to straight” (or any type of therapy that has that as an objective). It does, however, have to do with opening our hearts and minds to other possibilities beyond the narrative of this day.

Second, I think it is more important than ever to clarify attractions/inclinations experienced from sexual/romantic attractions/inclinations experienced. This is because not all attractions/inclinations are sexual or romantic in nature. However, our society imposes that expectation by romanticizing/sexualizing nearly all relationships, and so many people absorb that expectation and integrate their responses to attractions/inclinations through that lens. Truthfully, I think the world would change overnight if people came to realize that not all attractions/inclinations are sexual/romantic in nature. I can see it reducing the probability that people would feel the need to “explore” to find out. People could again experience true friendship and closeness without wondering if that meant they were gay (or the second “Q” in LGBTQQ, which stands for “Questioning”). Further, sexual/romantic exploration tends to feel good (it feels good to be held, cared for, and chosen), so the consequence of romantic/sexual exploration may very well be a flood of “good feelings” that may influence how a person comes to view themselves. I would imagine this to be especially true if that exploration was with a person of the same sex because our culture seems to be overtly supportive of exploration in that way at this time.

Third, it would be valuable if people began to talk about attractions/inclinations in terms of appetites—and particular attractions/inclinations as particular appetites. Consider the following: We all have an appetite for pleasing sounds, but only some have particular appetites for certain types of music. We all have an appetite for food, but only some have particular appetites for certain types of food. We all have an appetite for relationships (of some sort), but only some have particular appetites for certain types of relationships—perhaps involving certain types of people. The particulars of any appetite are influenced by the environment we are soaking in – an idea first presented to me by an LGBTQ activist of all people!

Appetites are transformed by our experiences and the world knows this. When we experience something we don’t like, our appetite to continue experiencing it decreases. This could be with particular foods, or particular relationships. I know this first-hand for after I was sexually abused by a male while in my teens, I also experienced this; my particular appetite to be around men in a close way was pretty much annihilated (even though I still desired to belong within the fold of men). Because appetites transform based on the whole of our experiences (and the whole of our environment, according to what that LGBTQ activist told me), it seems sensible that transitioning to speaking about attractions/inclinations as appetites is something that the world does not want. If this shift did begin to occur, and if it caught on to the point where that type of language was embraced by a critical mass of people, then society would be made even further aware of how particular appetites are not static. The result is that people would more easily see that statements claiming people are “created that way” (with particular appetites) are false. This is in line with that that LGBTQ activist shared with me when he told me that “environment plays a factor in the development of our attractions.”

Of course, revealing the falsehood of static particular appetites is not for the purpose of calling out a person who says that being gay is “who they are,” but rather so that we can provide a hope for those who are ready (or near ready) to walk away from those types of identities and their associated narratives even if their particular appetites still persist. It’s merely about being able to see oneself in a different light, which matters because how we see ourselves influences what we perceive we ought to do to pursue fulfillment. And many people are burnt out from a pursuit of fulfillment that has simply never given them the satisfaction they thought they would experience. Many of these people have spoken to me about their newfound freedom after departing from their prior way of seeing themselves as LGBTQ+. All of them had felt trapped where they were, and it was through clarified language (introduced lovingly and appropriately) that they were able to see a way out of it. For many, it has allowed them to re-center their identity on Christ, who they have come to know loves them more than they ever could have imagined. When I think of joy, I think of what radiates from the hearts of these people.

Now, if we strive to elevate the language to include these types of nuances, perhaps we could in some small way help bring that experience to others. Given the joy they now experience, I hope and pray that everyone might open their hearts to growing in their understanding of this topic. I know that I have a lot of room to grow as well. Again, real people with real hearts are who await us in the world. Let us never forget that.

Lisa: Thank you, Hudson! You always present ideas that are both sound and refreshing, and I’m so glad you’re out there speaking and teaching!

Folks, order a few copies of Hudson’s Lighthouse CD to share around!

The Joy of Expectant Waiting

By Jeannie Ewing

There are so many beautiful words to describe active waiting: expectancy, joy, pregnancy, anticipation. It’s what we tend to experience during the Advent season. Active waiting (also called Advent or expectant waiting) evokes incredible hope in us, because we are on the cusp of watching how God’s plan unfolds for a specific promise.

A few points pertaining to this type of waiting will guide us as we move through our own journey. Think of the popular song, “I Wonder As I Wander” for this type of expectancy. A seed has been planted. Its in the germination stage right now, and what is required of you is to be vigilant and patience until the time of flourishing – which God determines – arrives.

We Wait In Community

Let’s look to a beautiful example of expectant waiting – the Visitation. What did the Blessed Mother do as soon as she heard the news of Elizabeth’s pregnancy and after she accepted the invitation to bear the Son of God? She went in haste to share this joy with her cousin! They were both pregnant with a promise, so they gathered together in friendship, in community, to allow the seed of human life to grow within them.

When we wait in joyful anticipation, we remember that ‘nothing is impossible for God.’ (Waiting with Purpose, p. 47)

Have Confidence in God’s Promise

One of my favorite saints-to-be is Blessed Solanus Casey. He is well known for his famous quip, “Thank God ahead of time.” What does this mean for us when we are waiting – often with a certain amount of restlessness or tension – for new birth, new life, or a new phase of life to begin? We focus on who God is and all He has already accomplished in our lives. It’s important to thank God for all that He has done, is doing, and will do for us. That’s what expectant faith is – it’s faith that is confident in God.

We know He will act, and we pray accordingly – with expectation of answered prayer.

Expect to Move from Community to Contemplation

God often prepares us for a particular mission in cycles and seasons. We know this from our waiting experiences that somehow give way to seasons of activity and then back to dormancy. If expectant faith relies upon our lives in relationship, then we know we are being formed by those to whom we are closest – family, friends, neighbors, co-workers, spouses, children.

The people who live with us see us at our best and worst. They might draw out specific flaws or weaknesses – tendencies toward impatience, for example. As we enter into prayer each day, God reflects this reality to us so that we might allow Him to further chisel away the imperfections that deter us from spiritually advancing.

Then, one day, or perhaps gradually, we will move from a stage of activity to the desert. Community tends to precede contemplation, in that God draws us – whether quite literally (as in the case of an anchoress or hermit) or interiorly – into a more reflective state of solitude. It is during our time in the desert when God guides us more directly, though we cannot see or feel much of anything.

We wait – always in joyful hope – whether in community or contemplation.

This post was adapted from Chapter 3 in my book, Waiting with Purpose: Persevering When God Says “Not Yet.”