The day I was in the presence of a rockstar

Well lookie who hasn't written a post in almost a month again. Alas.

Things I've wanted to turn into blog posts in recent weeks but didn't:

• The day I touched a squirrel's tail.
• The day I saw deer in my office parking lot.
• The day my department had a half-day off-site meeting at a country club across the interstate from our building, and I got to spend the time staring out the window at the beautiful mountainous view. While paying attention, of course. I pay better attention when I can see the beautiful views than when I know there are pretty sights out there that I can't see.
• Numerous articles written by various people about a variety of controversial, amusing, or irritating topics.
• The video I saw the other day of Pope John Paul II laughing at something. That man. I love him.

Oooh, there we go. See, I have all these boring, inane, or overdone things I sometimes get the urge to write about, but I mean, who wants to read a post about touching a squirrel's tail? I mean, it was a pretty epic experience, but...you know...nah, it was awesome. (Also, the lilacs. I didn't mention lilacs on that list.) (Or about today when I found some pictures of azaleas I had taken during my time in DC that I emailed myself recently so I'd be able to put them on my background at work, and when I couldn't decide between four of them today I figured out how to set it so that it rotates the four periodically throughout the day. That made me pretty happy. Of course, most of the time these days my work is such that I am using both of my screens, so I rarely see my background picture, but at least I know it's there when I need a bit of brightening up.)

But JPII. Let's talk about him, shall we? I have only recently begun to realize what an important role he's played in my faith journey through the years. I mean, he was the Pope for the first 20 years of my life, so it'd be impossible to have not been influenced by him at least a little bit. He was a pretty influential man, after all - he sort of helped defeat communism, and he wrote this little thing we now call Theology of the Body, and he declared a few saints. Etc. He also started this small movement called World Youth Day. Maybe you've heard of it.

He also founded an institute that would make me a Master 30 years later. But we'll get to that in a minute.

My faith journey was sort of a boring one, without any huge conversion moments, or any deep moments of despair. Just a quiet, slow discovery and uncovering of this beautiful faith into which I was lucky to be born. I never went through a phase where I didn't want to go to Mass (well, I'm sure there were Sundays and Holy Days of Obligation here and there), and once I got to college I certainly never entertained thoughts of "I'm in college now! I don't have anyone making me go to Mass! Sweet!" By the grace of God, of course. It also helped, I'm sure, that I was at a Catholic institution that has Masses aplenty, and a majority of students who at least identify as Catholic. No one thought I was weird for going to Mass, and, at least for me my freshman year, Mass was a dorm-community event. (I would subsequently discover the beauty of the Basilica, and the more traditional liturgical practices found therein, but I'm sure having that faith community Sunday nights was very beneficial to me at the time.) All good things, all by the grace of God. And college is when I started really learning about my faith - not just the whats, but the whys. The teaching on contraception was a big part of that, but it went beyond that as well.

And then, April of my freshman year, Pope John Paul II died.

It's funny; for much of my life that I was aware of these things and remember them, JPII was an old man, bent and weakened by Parkinson's. And yet, when I think of him now, I think of his younger, more robust self - those delightful images we see of his more playful, active side. Of course, in both images of him - younger and older - I see a beautiful man and a wonderful example of living holiness in everything.

When he died, I didn't know that much about him, really. I knew some of the things he had done and written and said and been, but more in a general sense. I loved him then in the sense that he was like everyone's grandfather. Extremely wise, extremely holy grandfather. He had done so much for the Church, and his death left a question mark of where the Church would be led next. I knew how important he was to the Church - and to the world - and I felt it very deeply when he died. That weekend, when it was obvious he was reaching the end, was my dorm's Father/Daughter Weekend. The moment the news announced that he had died, I was working in our convenience store on campus. There was a TV across the student center from where I was cashiering, so I could see what was going on. I had to fight the tears when I saw that it was finally announced. And then, a few hours later, I went out to dinner and a dance (I think there was dancing, anyway...) with my dad, and my friends and their dads, and my dormmates and their dads. I was really sad, though, and almost wished I could stay to go to a candlelight vigil they were going to hold on campus at the Grotto that night. (I did have fun regardless, though. :) )

The first time going to Mass after that, when they get to the part during the Eucharistic Prayer where they say the pope's name - and they had to say "the late John Paul" - boy, that was weird. I had never heard anything but John Paul II said at that part. Anyway, a few days after he died, they had a special memorial Mass for him during their regular daily evening Mass time. And I decided to go. I don't think I had gone to daily Mass at all that year - or really, even much before college, period. I'm also not sure if I had gone into the Basilica more than once or twice up to that point. Let me tell you, though, that Mass, at that time, for that purpose, it did something to me. I fell in love a little bit. I started going to daily Mass more and more, which eventually led to my liturgical preferences changing bit by bit, and was the reason I found myself at the Basilica for 5:15 Mass one day that happened to be the feast of St. Thomas Aquinas - and the choir was there, singing lots of Latin, and lo, I discovered how beautiful it is.

Anyway, lots of stuff just happened that fit together so well and led me to be the Catholic I am today. I ended up at a Catholic graduate school that was founded by John Paul II because it was all I wanted to study. I didn't want the degree, I wanted the knowledge that JPII had deemed important enough to dedicate a whole institute to. And then a few years later, just over seven years after he died and changed my life, I found myself in a chapel, working in another Catholic organization that's been so influenced by him, blessed to be in the presence of a first-class relic of John Paul II - a drop of his blood on a piece of cloth. (Side note: Catholics are weird and kind of crazy. We venerate drops of blood with all seriousness. But we're also pretty awesome.) I got to be in the presence of JPII. And it blew me away. He's meant so much more to me, in my life, than I realize, and I have a feeling it's just the beginning.

I want to write more, because there's so much more I didn't even say, and so much I've already said so poorly, but I just don't know how to get it out. I don't even really understand it. But what I do know is that I love John Paul II. And I'm so thankful for Poland and all the great saints it's given us, and all the great priests alive today that bless so many of us. (I've yet to meet a Polish priest I didn't like.) And...God is just so amazing, the things he brings together to help us on our faith journeys. I just can't fathom not believing in God. I can't fathom not loving him. But, there but the grace of God!

O death, where is thy victory? O death, where is thy sting?

Hopefully you all know today is Easter. (Although, based on the number of things I've seen that have been scheduled today/yesterday/last night, that knowledge is either not very common or not very important.)

Anyway. Easter is just...fabulous. It's really the best day of the year. It's the most important day we have. Christ is risen! Alleluia! He is risen so that we can rise with him, and be born to new life with him.

I love Easter. I really do. But I love the whole Holy Week, the whole Triduum. And I really love Good Friday. Without Good Friday there wouldn't be an Easter Sunday. In my spiritual life, I feel close to Jesus when contemplating his passion and death, his suffering. But at the same time, I have to admit - sometimes, in my less rational moments, I think he couldn't really understand suffering in the same way I experience it, because his period of suffering was so short. (Dumb thing to think, I know. It's obviously not true in the slightest - he suffered in a way I never have experienced, and never will. I mean, he took on the suffering of all of our sin. That's...more than I can even imagine, let alone endure.) And sometimes I think, well, yeah, he suffered a lot, and was willing to take that on for all of us, but he knew he'd be resurrected, he knew how it would end. But that's not exactly necessarily true, is it? I mean, he knew that on the one level - his divine knowledge. But he was also human, and his human knowledge didn't have all the awareness of the future that his divine knowledge did. It's impossible to know what that would be like - but I recently read something that compared it to those times when we're afraid of something that we know, really, won't harm us (most likely) but there's still that modicum of doubt that maybe it won't all be ok. Jesus knew, through his knowledge as part of the Trinity, that he would be resurrected. But as a human, of course he feared what he knew was coming - he feared the pain of death. His perfect divine knowledge didn't make him less human. I don't know, maybe he did know beyond a doubt, even in his human nature, that he would be resurrected on the third day. Even if I knew, though, beyond a doubt, that after undergoing immense pain and suffering, utter humiliation, completely despised, and eventually dying, that I would go straight to heaven...I would still be reluctant. I would still want to find another way. I would want to avoid it if I could.

Point being, Jesus still chose all that. Probably knowing, at least on some level, that the outcome would be resurrection, and knowing why he had to endure it. At the same time knowing what it would mean - the pain, the humiliation, the exhaustion, the abandonment he would feel. He willingly took it all on. Who am I to say he doesn't understand my suffering? Of course he does. He feels everything I feel. He feels my pain, my suffering - he has given me a cross that he knows perfectly and intimately, because he chose it for me. He measured it perfectly, making sure it isn't too much for me to bear, but he also carries it with me. Jesus embraced his cross for me - who am I to deny the cross he gives me? In taking up his cross, he took up mine, too - not so that I wouldn't have to, but so I wouldn't have to bear its burden alone. We do what we can, and he does the rest. It's through the cross that we are saved, through the cross that we are reborn in Jesus' resurrection. The motto of the Holy Cross priests (who run Notre Dame) is Ave Crux, Spes Unica - Hail the cross, our only hope. And oh, how true that is. The cross makes today the joyous day that it is, the miraculous, wondrous day.

Because really, in the end, God's already won. That doesn't mean there won't be suffering in this life, but death has been conquered, and we have been granted eternal life because of today. Because of Christ's suffering, death, and resurrection, we are granted new life.



And that's the best thing anyone ever has, ever could, ever will do for us. It's nothing short of everything we need.

UPDATE: This. http://whispersintheloggia.blogspot.com/2012/04/why-in-world-would-we-call-this-day.html
Archbishop Dolan says it so much better than I can.

Never too far

Two weeks ago, my work had a day-long staff retreat at the Cabrini Shrine. The priest who lead the retreat, gave the talks, etc, was very focused on confession and - especially - on the mercy of God. I don't think it's a point that can be overemphasized. He stressed multiple times how important the sacrament of confession is - regardless of what sins a person might have on his or her soul. Yes, if there's a serious sin it should be confessed ASAP, but even if there are just little sins, they build up. He had so many great analogies, and such great things to say about it, that I really wish the whole world could have heard it. (I often felt that way during grad school - the things my professors had to say, if only everyone else could hear them, of course they'd feel the same way I do!) But alas, both then and now, the people I know have to hear these things disseminated through me. Sorry.

Anyway, one of the points he made that I loved was that days are to showers what months are to confession. For example: most people shower every day. Sometimes people go two days without showering, but usually by the end of the second day you sort of just really want to take a shower. Showering daily isn't something we have to do, but most people just make the time for it in their daily routines. With confession, it's not necessary to go every month (it's technically only necessary to go at least once a year) - barring grave sin, of course - but often, if you wait two months to go (or more), you just really start feeling it. Even if you don't realize that's what you're feeling. There have been multiple times when I just start to feel really...icky isn't the word, but my mood is just generally more down, my thoughts are less happy and joyful, and it's just harder for me to feel connected to the world and people. And then I realize it's been quite some time since my last trip to the confessional. It's really truly amazing the graces that come with it. Even if the actual moment of confession isn't particularly enjoyable, even if the priest looks at his watch while you're confessing (true story), that's not the point of confession. It doesn't have to be a deep, moving, emotional experience. Sometimes it is, but sometimes it's just not. The graces that come afterward, though, well they're just something amazing. The world looks brighter. I feel like a weight has been lifted, even if I didn't realize there had been one to begin with. And sometimes it doesn't necessarily feel like that, either, but I can assure you, the graces are there. Nothing is wasted with God! Point being: going to confession regularly is very, very good. During Lent (a whole like, what, three times now) I've been going every two weeks, and I have to tell you, it's great. I really can feel a difference. Of course, there are other things going into that, but man is it so much easier going every two weeks rather than waiting two months or more.

(For the record: I almost always have to fight myself to get to confession. It's not a particularly enjoyable thing to sit there pondering one's sins, realizing all the failures that have happened, and then have to go tell the worst things about oneself to another person. But in the end, it's Jesus that's there. And really, he already knows. But by taking those to Jesus through the person of the priest, I'm able to hear those words of absolution, which are wonderful, and I'm able to get that penance that helps repair some of the damage my sins have done to the body of Christ, the whole community of mankind. So it's always, always worth it.)

The priest also talked about how not going to confession often leaves your spiritual life like a pond - rather stagnant, without anything moving through it. He talked about how ponds tend to get scummy and dirty, because they're not being continually cleansed and refreshed by new water moving through it. How true that is of us if we're not allowing God to move through us continually, refreshing us and renewing us! Confession isn't necessary for venial sins, it's true. But waiting for those bigger sins, or just going once in awhile, it lets the little sins add up. They're forgiven at Mass, yes, but taking them to the confessional allows an extra heap of grace to cleanse your soul. The longer you wait to go to confession, the more those little sins build up, numbing you perhaps to the bigger ones, and to even the voice of God. It allows for a greater complacency, and doesn't help your relationship with God at all. I know my own experiences aren't universal, but God created the sacrament of confession for a reason. He wants us to utilize it. Jesus wants us to engage with him through the priest in the confessional, both for our own good and for the good of the body of Christ. I mean, there's a reason that, after he was resurrected, the first thing Jesus told his disciples aside from spreading the Gospel and baptizing was that the sins they forgive would be forgiven, and those that were retained would be retained. The sacrament of confession must have been important to Jesus if he mentioned it upon his first meeting with his disciples after his death. It's not just like an emergency room visit, to be used only in dire need. It's there for us all the time, to maintain and improve our spiritual health, even when we're not feeling particularly sick. I mean, goodness, the Pope goes to confession, what, at least once a week I'm sure. (I know I've heard a frequency at some point, but can't remember it off the top of my head.)

There's a point for most people where confession can become too frequent - when it becomes a problem with being too scrupulous - but the majority of people fall on the other end of the spectrum. We live in a culture where claiming things as objectively wrong is, well, wrong, and most certainly frowned upon. A culture where we celebrate and turn into celebrities those who practice lifestyles that engage in risky, dangerous, unhealthy behavior - look at the plethora of reality shows in which we watch people make fools of themselves, follow along as they live their shallow lives that place looks and social status above all else, and encourage their morally bankrupt behaviors by continuing to tune in every week. We love a good scandal, and yet, what's really scandalous these days? In a culture that emphasizes looks over morals, drama over character, and selling people's lives - even if that means bending the truth a bit to make their lives more interesting - over encouraging honesty, fidelity, sacrifice, and self-control, it's certainly not a popular concept to admit to doing wrong, and commit to doing one's best not to fall into that trap again. The fact is, though, that there is ultimate Truth in this world, and there are simply some things that are wrong. Of course, this discussion is different when it's with a non-Catholic, since a non-Catholic wouldn't be able to go to confession and receive absolution (as far as I know). But that doesn't mean there's not an ultimate, objective Truth. Everything the Church teaches is based on Truth. The sins we confess, the sins we try to avoid? They're not just sins for Catholics. That's one of the interesting things about this recent contraception discussion - yes, the first and foremost problem with the mandate is that it is directly forcing Catholic employers to go against Catholic teaching and pay for birth control. But underneath that issue is the fact that Catholics are against birth control because it is bad for people. It's not just bad for Catholics. It's bad for everyone. So there's a problem with discussing it as though contraception is only a Catholic issue. Obviously Catholics don't want to mandate that birth control be outlawed, as some seem to claim and believe, but we do believe that it is bad for everyone, and no one should use it.

That's another topic for another time, though.

This post is about confession. And now it's several days after I started writing this (and intended to post it), but alas. If you haven't been to confession in a while, go. Just go. It's hard, and it might hurt, and it'll be awkward and scary and weird. But it's just so worth it. I've been taking a class with the Denver Catholic Biblical School this year, which is the first year of a four-year program. The first year starts with the Old Testament (appropriately enough), and it's been fabulous. A few weeks ago we were covering the story of Daniel, and obviously we discussed his sin with Bathsheba and the results that came from it. And one of the things that's important to discuss is why he, who did such a major sin, was still so favored by the Lord - and yet his predecessor, Saul, who didn't exactly do any (one) thing quite as bad as that ended up...well, not so good. The answer? Psalm 51. Saul (and many others in the Old Testament) never acknowledged his sins. He never sought absolution, never sought forgiveness from the Lord. But when David was rebuked by Nathan for what he had done, he was immediately incredibly ashamed, and knew exactly the wrong he had done - and that he had to seek the Lord's forgiveness. Read Psalm 51. It's beautiful. It shows how much we need God's mercy and forgiveness, each time we fall. We're going to fall, it's going to happen. We all have original sin, and we're all predisposed to fall to sin. But we have the sacrament of confession for when we do. It's there for us. It's important for us. We don't have to do something as bad as sleep with another's spouse and then have that person's spouse killed to need forgiveness. Each little sin we do murks up the waters, so to speak. It clouds our judgment. It keeps us from growing closer to God. Confession cleans the water. It keeps us stronger so that we don't fall to sin as frequently, or (hopefully) in such big ways.

Another analogy the priest used at our retreat was in Lord of the Rings. He showed two clips, including the clip of Frodo on Weathertop when he puts on the ring to try to escape the Nazgul. I've been re-reading the books lately, too - still on the first one, but there is some great expansion on that ring sequence in the books. Frodo's putting on the ring is like us falling into mortal sin. The devil can't really see us when we're in the light of God, but he's always trying to tempt us to put on the ring, so to speak, so that we come out of that light and become visible to him - like Frodo disappeared from view but became visible to the Black Riders. The ring is always tempting him to put it on, knowing that once he does it'll make him easier to find, and easier for Sauron to get the ring back to himself - and ruin Frodo on the way. Confession, though, God's mercy, helps fortify us to say no to the temptation of putting on the ring, whatever that may look like in our own lives.

I really just can't encourage people enough to go. I always feel like I'm doing it wrong, every time I go, but really, God just wants us to go. He wants us to go, be honest with ourselves and with him (he already knows what we've done anyway, so there's no point in hiding it), and do our best not to fall again. We will, of course, but he knows that too. And that's why he made Confession a sacrament. It's for our good, so that we can be with him. One of my favorite passages in the Bible (well, one of many), is Luke 15. Pretty much the whole chapter. The parable of the Lost Sheep is one of my favorites, and the Prodigal Son story is great as well. It highlights how much God wants us with him. He'll leave his 99 sheep to go find the one who's wandered away. He'll do anything to get that one sheep back. He died so that he could find us and bring us back. We're never too far for him to seek us, never too far for him to find us and return us to his flock. He made the sacrament of Confession so that he could lead us back, because we can't do it on our own. In the Prodigal Son parable, the son spends what he has prodigally, until he has literally nothing and decides that being a servant in his father's house is better than where he has ended up. But his father doesn't let him do that. He welcomes him back with open arms. All the son had to do was start back toward his father's house, and his father did the rest. All we have to do is turn back to God in the confessional, and God does the rest, taking us into his arms and killing the fatted calf. As the priest at our retreat said, the son was prodigal in spending his money, but God is prodigal with his mercy. He gives it out abundantly and extravagantly, but he never runs out.

Really, the point is, there's just nothing like confession. You can be sorry for your sins and feel God's forgiveness to an extent, but there's just something about hearing those words "I absolve you from your sins in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit" that just...oh, it's just so good. There's no question. You're forgiven. God is pleased with your efforts, little though they may be (or big), and he has rewarded you with forgiveness and eternal life. And, you know, for those five minutes afterward, you just feel so totally clean and as worthy as you can be of God's love.

Sorry about the long post. But I can't say enough about the sacrament. I'd be lost without it. The Eucharist is obviously pretty much the most important sacrament, but just as there can't be an Easter Sunday without Good Friday, we need confession to be worthy of that most holy sacrament in which we take the very body and blood of Jesus into our own bodies. (And, also important to note, we need priests for both! Pray for our priests, as they are probably always under spiritual attack, and we need them!)

Confession is a beautiful sacrament. Like I said before, it's hard, and awkward, and scary, and painful, and something we'd probably rather avoid - but when you start to get too nervous to go because of that, just look to the cross. Jesus' crucifixion was beyond painful, it was bloody, it was scary, it was the most difficult thing anyone could ever endure. But it is also so beautiful. And it is because of that beautiful and ugly death that we are able to have our sins forgiven through confession, that we are able to become worthy to enter eternal life with the Lord. So why not take advantage of it?

By His holy cross, He has redeemed the world.