For the Birds

This past week I had the privilege of visiting with friends that I no long get to see on a regular basis. As always, being in their presence, whether in Athens, GA or in New Orleans, LA, brought me great peace, inspiration, and energy to live my life seeking the Spirit always.  Thank you, friends, for being marvelous blessings in my life.

Now, you may be wondering what the phrase "for the birds" has to do with my above thoughts.  Well, as you may know, the phrase "for the birds" often designates that something is insignificant, unimportant, or trivial.  I'm going to spin this phrase to mean the quite the opposite as I reflect on an experience of mine this week. Earlier this week, I went to the Audobon Zoo with a friend. Rarely do I go to the zoo, but anytime a friend who has not been there before wants to go, I welcome the opportunity. As we wandered through the different animal exhibits, we came upon the aviary. As you might expect inside this sealed off space, we found many different breeds of birds occupying the trees, branches, bushes, ponds, etc.  However, what you may not realize is that these different breeds of birds came from all different parts of the world.  The birds covered a wide spectrum of sizes and colors, too. They were magnificent to be around.  Their diversity struck me as interesting because many of these birds were out of their natural environments and living among other birds that were indigenous to completely different environments from their own. Yet, all of the birds seemed to have adapted quite well to each other and their shared home.  Upon seeing this, I reflected upon how often we, as humans, have difficulty getting along with other humans from very different environments, cultures, customs, etc. Are we not supposed to be more intelligent and rational than simple birds? Sometimes, I wonder about this.  Also, these birds not only were living in peace with one another, but they were not upset by our human presence at all. They crossed beneath our feet, flew over our heads, and sang their pleasant songs in ways that almost seemed to welcome us into their space.  How welcoming are we to others who are from "different parts of the world" than us?  Each time we see violence, poverty, injustice, hate, etc. perhaps we should think of the birds living in peace with one another sharing their space and resources so that they all may coexist beautifully. Is this not the purpose of God's creation?

So, next time you hear the phrase "that's for the birds" think about how it may be more appropriate to say "that's for the humans" instead. The Spirit was very much present with the birds in the aviary and as as a result of my being there, the Spirit was very much present with me, too.

May we be ever-faithful, ever-mindful, and ever-joyful.

The Spirit of the Blue Dot

I just saw this shared on Facebook, and I figured I had to pass this along. Enjoy the reflection on the power of the Spirit that pervades and continues to pervade this tiny yet marvelous piece of God's creation.

The tiny blue dot.

May we be ever-faithful, ever-mindful, and ever-joyful.

(W)Holy Spirit Come!

Hello everyone,

As many of you know, this past week marked the yearly occasions of Halloween and All Saints' Day. This week began with a reflection from a visiting priest that I heard last week. He shared a story with us about a girl whom he had met in his days as a missionary.  This girl, who had been sold into a life of prostitution for 14 years in Haiti, said upon her rescue that "we should not tell God how big our problems are, but rather, we should tell our problems how big God is." Now, situations like this girl's are hard for many of us to comprehend, but we can see in her saintliness a path of faith that is accessible to all of us.

As Halloween approached, I made sure to share with my students that the history of Halloween simply includes preparing ourselves to celebrate All Saints' Day. Halloween is simply an older English word for Hallow's eve (the evening before honoring all holy people). With this understanding, I turn my thoughts toward our school-wide mass on All Saints' Day. First of all, at my school, rarely do we refer to our masses as such. Rather, those Eucharistic gatherings are called "school-wide liturgies". I mention this because when we understand that the meaning of the word "liturgy" refers to the "work of the people," the celebration of our school community makes a lot more sense.  When trying to gather a total of 1300 people or so for mass, much work must come together to bring the Eucharist alive for all involved. A symphonic band, a men's chorus, acolytes, student ministers, lectors, and symbolic decorations are much of what must fall into place in order for the Eucharistic celebration to hopefully leave those in attendance feeling inspired to continue the work of the Spirit. At this particular liturgy, our celebrant, an ordained Brother of the Sacred Heart, challenged the congregation (mostly adolescent boys) to think of being holy as simply our attempt at being "whole". This simple message of always striving to be as "whole" or complete a person as can be is one that I believe the young men could relate to as they try to figure out who they are and what they are called to do. For the rest of us, this is a good reminder that being holy does not mean always doing everything right, but rather, just trying to be authentic versions of ourselves in all that we do.

How do we take a step toward being more (w)holy? One thing we can do is remember the words of the Haitian girl: don't tell God how big your problems are; tell your problems how big God is. By aiming to keep our lives in this kind of perspective, truly, we are closer to being holy authentic complete people.

May we be ever-faithful, ever-mindful, and ever-joyful.

A Youthful Spirit

So, it has been about a month since my last post. Much has been going on with work and what not, but in recent days I have experienced a couple of happenings that I would like to share with you. These events are quite different in nature, but what I think they all do is show the limitless boundaries in which the Spirit operates.

First, I'd like to start with something that I experience on a daily basis. As many of you know, I coach cross country at the high school level. I work primarily with 12-14 year old boys. These guys compete in 2-mile races and their abilities range from 11 minutes to 26 minutes. What strikes me as amazing every day is the support and encouragement that most of these guys give each other. One young man in particular approached me to suggest that another team member be moved up into a better training group because their current group was too slow for him. This kind of selflessness at such a young age is truly inspiring for me. Watching these guys work hard (while still maintaining their silliness and immaturity of course), gets me excited for the type of young men and athletes they will become down the road. I know that with each practice, our guys are experiencing the Spirit in their lives through the camaraderie of their teammates as well as the care of those of us who coach them. I am eager to see how the rest of our season plays out.

The second item is a more isolated event that I had the honor of experiencing this weekend. I was invited to take part in one of the four overnight retreats that our senior class attends every year. This retreat focuses on understanding true Christian manhood. Seeing seniors in high school come together for a couple of days and open themselves up to the surrender and compassion needed to live a truly humble life in the Spirit is awesome. This retreat gave me the opportunity to view the upperclassmen in light of my daily experiences with the lowerclassmen. This allowed me to view the maturity and attitude of the 7th, 8th, and 9th graders that I coach to that of these seniors. I must say that these seniors, while still having much room for growth, already seem to have a faithful grasp of life. As one speaker mentioned, this age group is living in a unique stage of life where they have the energy of boys with the wisdom of men.  This speaker encouraged the young man to seize the rest of their senior year as well as the next several years of life and become powerful men through their faith, humility, and love. I pray that these young men will continue to face the challenges of their lives with a spirit of fortitude that can only come from God. While the retreat contained many wonderful discussions and activities, I will not mention those in the interest of maintaining the surprise and wonder of the young men yet to make their retreat. Just know that the Spirit of courage and confidence that we try to share with the seniors was very alive this weekend and will continue to be thanks to the efforts of the campus ministry team and faculty who put on these wonderful retreats.

I pray that we all can find the innocence and energy of our youth and combine it with the wisdom and knowledge of adulthood to become the best human beings we can be in this life. The Spirit is alive and well.  If we continue to run the race and take time to retreat, we are certain to experience the Spirit daily!

May we be ever-faithful, ever-mindful, and ever-joyful.

A Humble Spirit

Hello, friends,
I can't believe that it has been almost a month since my last post.  I guess I need to make a more concerted effort amid my new schedule to reflect and write a bit more.  This being said, I do have thoughts that come to mind during the day, but I simply haven't taken the time to put them down in writing.

Anyway, a thought that has remained in the forefront of my mind is one from a few weeks ago. I heard a priest give a homily on one of the most important qualities that we can possess: humility. The timing of his lesson was interesting given that football season was starting and certain collegiate football players were gaining media attention for being anything but humble. I realized then that we have way too many egos in our world today.  The priest shared a quote with us this quote from a best selling author:

There are two kinds of people in the world. One kind of person when entering a room will say, "Well, here I am!" The other kind of person when entering the room will not say anything but rather other folks will say, "Oh, look, there he is!" 

This quote resonated with me because I know at times I have been the first kind of person drawing undue attention to myself rather than just allowing myself to be present.  I thought of this quote in terms of our presence before amid the Spirit of God. I feel like God always notices us when we "enter the room" and is saying "Oh, look, there he is!" God has every right to be the first kind of being who brings attention to God's self, but rather, always shows us loving attention.

So, as we go forward this week and beyond, let us all recognize the presence of others rather than making our presence known.

May we be ever-faithful, ever-mindful, and ever-joyful.

God bless Earth

Hello friends,
Thank you for your patience in between my posts.  I have enjoyed beginning my new teaching job, but I am still trying to find a good time each week when I can sit and write.

My post this week may be one of the more random connections to the Spirit that I feel I have ever documented.  So, this past Friday evening, I competed in a two-mile road race with some of my training buddies.  Prior to the race, as expected, a rendition of the Star-Spangled Banner was played.  The race director played the famous Whitney Houston version of our national anthem.  Personally, I am not a fan of this version, and as a result, my mind wandered for most of the recording.  My mind did, however, wander toward the idea of patriotism.  Patriotism in the United States confuses me.  I often see and hear images, symbols, slogans, etc. that attempt to link patriotism to Christianity.  When we say/sing "God Bless America," what exactly do we mean?  Are we asking God to bless this country more than other countries? Are we claiming that we have the market on God's blessings while others receive God's hand-me-downs?  Are we invoking God to be on our side rather than on the side of others?  These are inflections and connotations that I can not help but feel sometimes.  I would like to think that when we say "God bless America" we are asking God for the grace to help others around the world by using the plethora of resources at our disposal to promote the common world good rather than for just our own benefit.  I think what is important here is to remember that the Spirit of God moves where it will and that includes any and all places of the world (not just the U.S.).  So, how did all of this come from listening to one of my least favorite national anthem recordings?  I can not say.  All I know is that I now have more food for thought.

In addition to this thought provoking recording, I found myself watching the movie, The Soloist (2009), on Saturday evening.  This is a remarkable movie about mental health, homelessness, and the power of music.  In this film, a Julliard level cellist, is living on the street after going through mental anguish as a young man.  This based-on-a-true-story movie, pointed out even more to me the confusion I find in being patriotic in this country.  We have so many resources in this country that could end national hunger, decrease poverty, and promote better standards of living for most people.  However, we seem to have such a problem making these resources available to others.  Meanwhile, we say "God bless America" while often turning a blind eye to these circumstances.  Why is that?  I wish I knew the answer.  So, I guess my challenge for all of us who live here in the United States and profess faith in God, is to remember our blessings daily and truly strive to give of ourselves to our countrymen and women (and ultimately the world citizens at large).  In doing so, I pray that our efforts may one day to say God bless the United Countries of Earth.

May we be ever-faithful, ever-mindful, and ever-joyful.

An Extra "Ordinary" Piece

As I start my new obligations as a high school religion teacher, I worry that I will not have as much time to devote to my blog.  I certainly will not give up on this entirely.  However, please be patient with me in my posting.  I'll try to post something each week even if it just a simple sharing of something I found inspiring.  Please enjoy this article that I found from one of my favorite websites recently.  The article builds off of my thoughts from last week.

Relevant Magazine Article

May we be ever-faithful, ever-mindful, and ever-joyful.