Overcoming Tough Times Together

Dear Friends,

What was the worst day of your life?

We might say: the day I lost my spouse, a parent, or child. Some would say the day my marriage broke up or our child got into trouble or turned away from us…the day I lost my job or found out I had a serious illness. Some would say the day my faith in God disappeared or the day I experienced emotional collapse.

Common in all these experiences is a sense of numbness or emptiness. Nothing makes sense anymore. The world has become a hostile place. God seems unreal and remote. Add in the breakdowns and violence in the physical and political worlds and our helplessness is complete. Very few of us go through life without times like this.

Today’s readings are about situations like ours, people like us from another time and place who likewise have come to the end of their resources. We can learn from them on how to face our own crises as individuals and as a people.

The Book of Daniel was written several hundred years before Christ, at a time when the Jewish people were fighting for their very survival. The Gospel of Mark comes out of another time of crisis 30 years or so after Christ’s resurrection. Jerusalem was then under foreign domination and the familiar was being swept away.

Let’s look for the meaning beneath the imagery of the calamitous times described in Daniel and Mark. Today, two thoughts gleaned from Daniel and Mark are worthy of our attention.

First, In the throes of suffering, things are not as they appear. We are not abandoned. God has not lost control. In fact, God goes before us, surrounds us, awaits us, welcomes us, offers us the freedom to shape life. It’s easy to recognize disaster. It’s more important to frame that disaster in the hope that God offers us.

Secondly, it is only as a community that we come through the disasters of life. Much as we would like to think of ourselves as independent, self-sustaining and capable of working through the challenging dimensions of life ourselves, we aren’t, and we can’t be. If you still think so, name anything important in life that we have not received from someone else. I do not exist without a we.

Individuals as well as groups fight the notion of being saved together. Some of us would rather be lonely than bound to others. Some of us fear being so lost in a community that our own personhood and efforts go unnoticed and undervalued. Or we might fear that, in carrying others we might get swept away ourselves.

Today’s readings tell us that only as interdependent people will we be saved. God and we together can and will overcome the threatening darkness.

The Letter to the Hebrews encourages us to hold fast to the confession our hope inspires without wavering, for the one who has made us a promise of life is faithful.

Whatever our difficulties, we have a God upon whom we can depend.

~Sister Joan Sobala

Being Generous

Dear Friends,

None of us would have faulted the woman in today’s Gospel if she held onto her two coins. None of us would have faulted the woman in the first reading had she told Elijah to get lost as he asked her for food. Yet each gave with dignity and trust. They each intuited these times as graced moments, opportunities to place God above all things in their lives. We know nothing more about the Gospel widow. We do know that for the widow of Zarephath, the oil and flour never ran out.

Today’s Scriptures are not just stories of generous widows. These stories tell us about the big-hearted attitudes of people.

Jesus doesn’t endorse the widow’s action. He doesn’t say “Go and do likewise.” What Jesus does is to call attention to her attitude of generosity and trust and in doing so, invites his listeners to give without measuring the cost.

Generosity is complex. How do I determine how much to share – when – why – with whom? How does one create in oneself an attitude of generosity – a non-clutching, other-centered style of living? We are not sure whether to give to the panhandler, pick up the hitchhiker, believe the story of destitution and the crocodile tears. Over the years, I’ve “been had” by professional needy people. Maybe you have, too.

There’s an irony in the story of the woman who gave two coins. Later, the temple she supported with her pennies would be destroyed in a war. Was her gift in vain? Is our gift in vain if the receiver misuses it, or the object of our giving is destroyed? No. Even in times of exploitation, what matters most for our personal and spiritual growth is the largeness of spirit that goes on within the exploited person.

There is no neat, tidy formula or answers to detailed questions about generosity. But I do know this: each of us has a head and a heart, an intuition or a hunch. Each of us carries the Gospel within us. If we rub our experiences against the Gospel enough, the rubbing can generate sparks to see by, and by which to act.

One contemporary story of generosity comes to mind. Last year, a single mother I know with two young children found life challenging given a recent divorce and the stress of the pandemic. In previous years, the family had supported a needy family at Christmastime.

This year, the organizers suggested that, due to her new circumstances, the mother might not want to take part in the program. “Absolutely not,” the mother replied. “I want my children to learn that Christmas is not just about us being taken care of. We’ll cut back somewhere. But we will adopt a family this year.” 

For those of us who try to hear the Word of God and keep it, the generosity of the widows in today’s readings are a reminder and a promise:

-        a reminder that what we have is not ours to covet or hoard, and

-        a promise that in some unspeakable way, the good we have and are will not run out in the sharing.

~Sister Joan Sobala

Remembering the Saints in Our Life

Dear Friends,

The number is over 730,000. That’s how many Americans have succumbed to the pandemic: famous people, your relatives and friends, mine as well. In many cases, death came to them without the presence of their loved ones.

On All Saints’ Day (Monday) and All Souls’ Day (Tuesday), the Church – all of us – take time to say “thank you, God” for their lives, for the lessons they taught, the goodness in them, the hard things they struggled to overcome.

It's easy to limit the notion of saint to the canonized and the worldwide, but the saints are all who have gone to God in the sure and certain hope of eternal life. These days, bask in their victory over death. Honor them for their faithfulness. Call on them to stand by you as you make your way.

Let’s think of our loved ones who have died – our own local homegrown saints. We can say that when they died, they crossed a threshold. One’s loved one is not where he or she was. That’s why the Risen Jesus told Mary Magdalen in the garden not to cling to Him (John 20.11-18). He had crossed a threshold. She still wanted Him back where He was. In order for Mary to continue in this new moment with the now-Risen Lord, she too had to cross a threshold. That’s the key to turning life-draining grief into new life. Not only do our loved ones cross a threshold in death, we must do so as well as they’re dying.

Another helpful thought comes from the Celtic branch of Christianity, where people speak of the “thin veil” that separates this side of eternity from the other. As the days grow shorter and the winter winds gather strength, let’s pause to peer through the thin veil. Consider our loved ones. They are closer than we think. Think of great ones whom you know only from a distance. Their greatness hides in us as well, waiting to be set free.

These are not the days to think of our loved ones with sustained sorrow, nor to count the saints or to name them. These are days to celebrate the full flowering of humanity as we take God‘s promise in Christ seriously.

This is the meaning of this day.

Now go out and join the saints.

Be saintly.

What a daring thing to do.

~Sister Joan Sobala

Accepting Our Sight from Christ

Dear Friends,

Jesus asked the same question in last week’s Gospel as He does today, “What do you want me to do for you?” Last weekend, Jesus directed that question to James and John. It was clear they wanted power and glory for themselves. They didn’t want to see, grasp, understand, absorb the mission, mystery and message of Jesus. They wanted control for very selfish reasons, and Jesus denied them their wish.

This week, as Jesus left Jericho to go up to Jerusalem, Bartimaeus clamored for attention, shouting until he was heard. The blind man, who was an embarrassment for the crowd, was suddenly urged forward by that same crowd because Jesus had noticed him.

Again, Jesus asks: “What do you want me to do for you?” This time the answer is very different. “I want to see,” Bartimaeus declared.

More than physical sight, Bt (let’s call him that) wanted to make sense of his life, to find meaning and purpose and to cease being a beggar. The Gospel tells us that, as soon as Bt saw, he began to follow Jesus up the road. The blind beggar had become a disciple – a disciple unlike James and John. Even in their closeness to Christ, James and John lacked hindsight, insight and foresight. They had trouble dealing with their blind spots about Jesus and themselves.

The one thing that Bt knew about himself that the others did not see in themselves was vulnerability. In this, he was like the people whom Jeremiah describes in today’s first reading – people in exile, unable to move at will, without resources to extricate themselves from their captivity.

Vulnerable people seem to remember God’s faithful promise more easily than people who are sure of their own power, abilities, successes. They remember and they draw from God’s own promise the courage to go on.

In a world of vulnerability caused by the pandemic, with its economic stresses, racial and gender tensions, as well as changing societal values about life and death, that question, “What do you want me to do for you?” is crucial. Christ continues to ask each of us this question when we present ourselves as wanting/needing something.

Is the boldness of Bt in us, not only to acknowledge our own vulnerability, but to know what to ask for and then what to do? Do we really want to see? To have others see?

Some would say that Bt was lucky. He asked and got his sight, with all that that implied. We ask, and God seems to say “NO.” But is the answer really “no sight” or is it “no sight now” or “other sight?”

In our world, with all our vulnerability, will we be curious enough to ask who is passing by as Christ comes up the road? Will we dare the crowd which want no part of the challenge? Will we know what to say when Christ asks us, “What do you want me to do for you?” Will each of us accept the sight we have been given? Will we follow Christ along the road?

~Sister Joan Sobala

Living More Simply While Helping Others Live

Dear Friends,

One day last week, I met the adult children of an elderly couple who were moving into an assisted living facility. “It took 10 days to empty their house,” one of them said. “I plan to begin divesting this winter!”

The accumulation of stuff creeps up on us. Some of it we really need to keep: seasonal furniture, sports equipment, clothing and decorations. We’ll use them all next year.

But we also put into basements, attics and self-storage units, things we may never use again, and if the truth be known, maybe we never did use. Some things we bought on a whim, other things relatives and friends gave us, and we couldn’t say no or didn’t want to say no. Some things are mementos of another time, another family.

Buying, storing, and keeping are ordinary human activities. There is nothing wrong with doing these things unless the buying, storing and keeping overtake our minds and hearts, and become excessively important to us or we accumulate without the realization that we could become tethered to stuff.

Pope Francis reminds his readers that, “The human person cannot do without material goods…These goods are absolutely indispensable to feed himself, grow, communicate, associate with others and achieve the highest purpose to which he is called.” Jesus never denied people what they needed to become all they could be in life, but He had no use for acquiring more and more without weighing the cost of the acquisition. Nothing that we have can earn God’s love for us. What makes a difference is who we are and what we do with what we have.

Here are some thoughts about dealing with the things we have in our lives in order to live more simply.

First, if you get a new shirt, slacks, coat, whatever, give away one that you have had for a while. Get a new one, give an older one away. Did you know that the average American discards about 70 pounds of clothing annually?

Secondly, share with those who could really use no-longer-needed, clean household items and clothing. New York Governor Kathy Hochul recently announced that 200 Afghan refugees will be coming to the Rochester area in a few months. Take what you wish to contribute to their households to Saint’s Place or Mary’s Place* in Rochester, where newcomers can get what they need to start out anew.

Develop or use a lending center for tools as a way of reducing unnecessary multiplication. Make it a place for sharing learning as well as tools.

Have you seen those neighborhood curbside lending libraries? Take a book. Don’t bring it back. Leave another. Build a tiny library near the road near your house.

As you look to downsize, be as generous as you can be so that others may live. Give, but don’t buy more or more often. Think with Jesus about where the real treasures of your life are.

~Sister Joan Sobala

 *Saint’s Place, 46 S Main Street, Pittsford, NY 14534     585.385.6860

  Mary’s Place, 414 Lexington Avenue, Rochester, NY 14613     585.270.8626

The Value of the Rosary

Dear Friends,

When our Sister Mary Kay Ryan was presented at her wake and funeral last week, she had in her hands a rosary that was passed down through three generations of Sisters of Saint Joseph before her – all relatives who had spent their lives in our Congregation. The practice of holding these beads in the coffin is a longstanding practice among some older Catholics. But today, many younger Catholics are unfamiliar with the rosary, its value and meaning. They don’t pray the rosary and might not even know how.

This blog is not intended to be a primer, but an encouragement to use this simple tool – the rosary – to keep before us significant events in the life of Jesus, and to honor Mary, His Mother, who had said the “Yes!” that brought the Word of God into our human reality in a way that has been decisive for all time.

Long before Saint Dominic gave us the rosary in 1214, meditations on the life of Jesus, the Lord’s Prayer, and the Angelic Salutation to Mary by the angel Gabriel were commonly used in prayer. In the rosary, Dominic gave people a way of organizing these prayers in an attractive way.

The Rosary was sometimes called the Psalter of Mary, because like the 150 psalms, the rosary was comprised of 150 Hail Mary’s, prayed in decades or groups of 10, between an Our Father and a Glory be.

After the Battle of Lepanto in the Gulf of Patras on October 7, 1571, when the Catholic European nations (The Holy League) defeated the Ottoman Empire, Pope Pius V declared October 7 to be the feast of Our Lady of Victory, because praying the rosary was understood as a significant religious reason the battle was won. Later, the name of the feast was changed to the feast of Our Lady of the Rosary, and this is how we know it today.

Because he believed that some important aspects of Jesus’ life were missing from the traditional way in which the rosary was prayed, St. Pope John Paul II, in 2002, added the “luminous” mysteries which focused on Jesus’ life from his Baptism by John to His self-giving at the Last Supper. After that, as a church, we lost the “Psalter” concept, but came to pray in a fuller way the meaning of Christ’s life.

As the beads slip through my fingers while saying the rosary, I sometimes concentrate on the mystery, sometimes on the words of the Hail Mary. There’s no one right way to say the rosary, but I have found, over the years, that the rosary takes me to another level of thought and prayer and gets me out of my own local world, local prayer, local needs. The rosary is a portable tool for prayer. We can carry it in the car to use as we drive along, on our bedside table to use while going to sleep or in our pocket for anytime, anywhere.

I realize that I have given you little detail about saying the rosary. Go ask someone to help you with that. My wish today is to encourage you to find or find again value in this form of meditative prayer. Pope Francis openly says, “The rosary is a prayer that always accompanies me. It is the prayer of ordinary people and saints. It is a prayer from my heart.”

Like Pope Francis, the editor of Give Us This Day, Mary Sommes, encourages us to pray the rosary. “These mysteries – sorrowful and joyful, glorious and luminous – are full-on encounters. Encounters with Jesus and Mary, with the Communion of Love within the Trinity, with the Communion of Saints in heaven. And on earth.”

~ Sister Joan Sobala

Helping Heal the Wounds of Divorce

Dear Friends,

Over the last several Sundays, the readings have dealt with issues of human interaction – in the name of God – or not. Last Sunday, those who considered themselves the bearers of God’s word wanted to reject those whom they thought did not have the right to speak God’s word. The week before, we saw Jesus reject the uselessness of children in the grand scheme of religion. Today, Jesus holds up the ideal of marriages that last. Next week, Jesus will ask us all to be willing to let go of everything in order to follow Him.

Whew! So much to take in and to use as the measure of our own lives. 

But let’s concentrate on today’s Gospel. Jesus is deep in conversation with the Pharisees about divorce. In Jesus’ day, only men could initiate the divorce procedure. The reasons for divorce could be flimsy (e.g. she’s an awful cook) or serious (adultery).

Specifically, in this Gospel, Jesus addressed the implications of divorce as it related to women. For a woman, divorce meant total disgrace in the community, loss of income and loss of children. Divorce was a catch 22: it was socially unacceptable for a woman to be on her own. No respectable man would marry a divorced woman. Marriages in Jesus’ time were arranged between families, so in the event of a divorce, whole families were negatively affected. In short, Jesus was addressing divorce, not as we know it today, but as a situation in which a woman was treated as an unwanted possession. Jesus took his listeners back to Genesis (today’s first reading) and reminded them that God made woman and man to be lasting companions, helpmates and partners.

Today, the divorce process is generated by the man or the woman. We know divorce through the experiences of our children, parents, relatives, neighbors, friends. Maybe our own divorce. No one enters marriage planning on divorce. No one enjoys divorce. It is a devastating experience arising out of human frailty, and its causes are numerous.

At its best, the Church needs to be a community of compassion and acceptance for all its members, including those whose marriages have fallen apart. Believers do not accept that our Church is always at its best in the way it handles marriages that end in divorce, but our belonging to the Church does not dissolve because of that. We believe that God is present to the couple who marries, whether the marriage entered into survives or not. God promises to be with us in our life journey, celebrates our victories and holds us up in our defeats, laughs with us in times of joy and cries with us in our moments of sorrow and sadness.

The Scriptural passages having to do with marital fidelity as the ideal are ultimately set against the background of God’s fidelity to the human community, the fidelity of Christ to us all, even in our most pronounced frailty.

The Church continues to look for ways to help heal the wounds of divorce. Some believers have found its solutions helpful. Others have not. The dialogue necessarily goes on. The promise of God to be with both the whole and the broken goes on. Let us be aware enough of the desire of God to hold all of us close that we hold one another close as well.

~ Sister Joan Sobala