“The Denial of Saint Peter”, ca 1610, Caravaggio (Michelangelo Merisi) (Italian, Milan or Caravaggio 1571-1610 Porto Ercole) (The Met)
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Never look to a man for answers.
Look to Christ who is the answer.
If you insist on looking to a man, then choose one who points to Christ.
For the best teacher is Christ Himself…and His best assistants are those who clearly say: “Don’t look at me.”
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—Howard Hain
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http://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/437986
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Then the LORD brought us out of Egypt with a strong hand and outstretched arm, with terrifying power, with signs and wonders, and brought us to this place, and gave us this land, a land flowing with milk and honey.
—Deuteronomy 26:8-9
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Last fall we went apple picking. We were a small party, composed of immediate family. It was a beautiful crisp day, just the kind you would order for such an excursion.
On our rounds we passed an old wood wagon, behind it and off a bit in the distance lay the remains of an abandoned stone farmhouse—roofless, hollowed out, its fireplaces and chimneys still the main draw. But is was a tiny hand-painted sign on the wagon right before me that most caught my attention:
“Honey is the only food that includes all the substances necessary to sustain life, including enzymes, vitamins, minerals, and water.”
I don’t know if it’s true or not, and I’m not going to spend much time investigating. I like the thought. That’s what matters. So I’m going to keep it, well not keep it, but steward it. Yes, ‘steward’ is a much better word:
Thus should one regard us: as servants of Christ and stewards of the mysteries of God.
(1 Corinthians 4:1)
So often an internet search can do quite the opposite. It can make us into investigators, examiners, maybe even mean-spirited inquisitors. It can turn us into lots of things, other than stewards.
Such an investigative approach also often opens the door to outright skepticism. It may even lead us into intellectual scrupulosity. And all scrupulosity, no matter its form or make up, steals joy. And that we just cannot allow.
On the other hand, we also have to be responsible. We can’t just “believe everything we hear and read”, right?
So what is one to do with such a pickle?
Well, a good steward should look to his master for advice, after all it’s his property we are called to steward on his behalf:
Now it is of course required of stewards that they be found trustworthy.
(1 Corinthians 4:2)
So there we have it. We must be stewards of God’s mysteries, and as stewards we must be found trustworthy.
Sounds straight forward enough. Tough to do though.
Perhaps this can help.
Let’s go step by step, at our Savior’s command:
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First, let us become more aware of the very mystery that is put into our care:
Our Father, who art in heaven…
Let us next adore what we do not understand:
hallowed be thy name;
Let us then accept the great gift of responsibility, handed over to each one of us daily:
thy kingdom come,
thy will be done
on earth as it is in heaven.
What happens next seems logical enough, we have to ask for help:
Give us this day our daily bread,
And with that, we address the inevitable—for even if we possess only a morsel of humility—we all know that disobedience on our part is bound to occur:
and forgive us our trespasses,
as we forgive those who trespass against us;
Now, having about all we need to proceed, it’s a very good idea to remind ourselves of an eternal reality: That the master is ultimately in control and oversees us closely—rooting us on to accomplish what he wills for us to achieve, all in his very name:
and lead us not into temptation,
But just in case we fail to avoid the snares and traps hidden in plain and disordered sight—especially from falling into the false belief that the “possessions” placed into our care are actually our own—we plead with great desperation, like Saint Peter and all true disciples who think they’ve become lost, that we don’t completely sink into the waters of darkness when our faith begins to falter:
but deliver us from evil.
And together we say:
Yes. I accept. I believe. I agree.
So be it.
(or in other words:)
AMEN.
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Now, if I can only find some raw milk for breakfast…
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Look down, then, from heaven, your holy abode, and bless your people Israel and the fields you have given us, as you promised on oath to our ancestors, a land flowing with milk and honey.
—Deuteronomy 26:15
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—Howard Hain
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For today’s homily, please select the video below.
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You can run but you can’t hide. An apple a day keeps the doctor away.
What a world it would be if we only spoke in clichés.
Is it the kind of world you and I live in?
Do we retreat into beaten-down meadows, like deer who lay where others have already flattened the grass?
There’s less work I suppose. And the grass may still be warm.
But it’s also kind of like Goldilocks and the Three Bears.
You can enter a home that isn’t yours, you can search for a bed that fits just right, but at the end of the day your cover will be blown.
You can run but you can’t hide.
After all, you’ve made your bed, now lie in it.
Perhaps it is such lying that is really the apple.
For picking fruit from someone else’s tree has never been a good idea.
Those kind of apples certainly keep the good doctor away.
But I guess we also have to be careful to not overcorrect.
We must not out of pride be unwilling to enter where others have already been.
No, that is wisdom. We should go where others have gone before. It just depends on who they were and where they went.
And no matter what, we shouldn’t hide within those spaces, pretend that they are our own, and perhaps worst of all, act as if we are the first to ever have entered—delusion of this kind leads us to the belief that we create anything at all.
We don’t.
Think of Adam in the Garden. God is busy whipping up the entire universe from out of nothing. Creating and sculpting, adding and adapting, breathing life into His new world. And Adam, well, he’s one of the building blocks. Yes, certainly a favorite. A favorite that God does not want to be alone.
And something spectacular takes place:
The LORD God said: It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suited to him. So the LORD God formed out of the ground all the wild animals and all the birds of the air, and he brought them to the man to see what he would call them; whatever the man called each living creature was then its name. The man gave names to all the tame animals, all the birds of the air, and all the wild animals… (Genesis 18-20)
God created, Adam named.
It is simply amazing. And humbling.
What an honor. And what a clear indicator of who is truly in charge.
We create nothing. That’s the bad news for those who want to be God.
We do though participate in the ongoing unfolding of God’s perfect and eternal world. We even seem to share the leading role. That’s the Good News for those who believe.
For our work is not to create. We simply cant. Only God can. And even if we “build” with what is already in existence, if we seemingly “create” something “new” with the building blocks we find already laying around, that “pseudo-creation” still isn’t our primary job.
Then what is?
Well, the original disciples of Jesus had a similar wonder:
So they said to him, “What can we do to accomplish the works of God?” Jesus answered and said to them, “This is the work of God, that you believe in the one he sent.” (John 6:28-29)
And there’s the crux of it, if you will.
Adam, we must remember, when in the supremely honorable position of naming God’s creatures was still naked, and he felt “no shame.” He hadn’t yet eaten what wasn’t his. He was not yet hiding “among the trees of the garden.” He still believed in the One Who Sends.
Adam was faithful. Adam was original. Adam knew he was God’s creation. And Adam was free to roam.
But Adam used his freedom to choose to become a slave.
Adam’s fall was a fall into self. A fall into creation, the creation of a great lie, that man creates on the same level as God.
It was a great fall. So steep was the cliff off which he went that no other story could ever bring more meaning to the most hackneyed line: “Once upon a time…”
Adam’s fall is a fall into denomination.
A fall into the church of self.
A fall into complete and utter cliché.
And it brought death to the great privilege of cooperating with God, of naming and stewarding on His behalf His created world.
But thanks be to God.
For someone truly original, and creative, finally came round.
He put the apple back up upon the tree and told the snake to take a hike.
His name is Jesus.
He is also called The Son of Man.
But of course we are free to just call Him God.
For about Jesus, nothing is cliché.
It is very clear, there’s absolutely no running or hiding when it comes to the Cross.
And when it comes to His love for us, there’s no apple that can keep the Divine Physician away.
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—Howard Hain
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Today, This Moment, The Year of Your Lord
My Child,
I thought I should write you this morning. To put down a few words. To speak into creation my ongoing love for you.
There are times when I watch you, somewhat at a distance. I leave that space so that my watching doesn’t impede your playing. But there is really no space at all. Because by not being “right with you” I get to see you as you truly are. My “distance” allows me to see you within the full scope of your existence. And never forget, my child, not for a second, I create your existence. It is not an event of the past. I am active. Always. I am always creating you, and I am always enjoying my creation. That is why I watch.
I watch you unfold. I watch frowns and frustrations unfold into smirks and full-blown smiles. I watch you evolve and grow. I watch you transform. I watch you fight then make up. I watch you get hurt then heal. I watch you hoard then share. Of course there are many times, my dear child, always in fact, that I want to jump in and save the day, to stop the fight, the hurt, the misunderstanding before it evens begins. But I love you too much to always deny you such good food and such nutritious drink.
I will your existence moment by moment, and my will is love. I know exactly how much you need to digest in order to provide for your perfect growth. I also know when too much of one nutrient or the denial of another is not part of my overall plan.
Perhaps that is the hardest thing about being a father, knowing that your maximum freedom within the ever-expanding bounds of my love is what you most need. Such liberty leads you into the divine individuality that I ultimately will to be achieved. And it’s also what makes you most valuable to our one, united, and very common family.
True liberty is what makes you most like me.
Please enjoy my gift this new day.
That’s what I will.
Enjoy my love. Enjoy your freedom. Enjoy the play of keeping it all within bounds. For you should also know, your freedom without my love is a very dangerous game. A game that as much as it grieves me to see any of my children play, I must allow, if the freedom I gift to you is to be of any value at all.
I am always with you. And know this—and know it for sure—if at any one moment, you choose to use your liberty to call out my name, I will scoop you up before you can even utter “the smallest letter or the smallest part of a letter” of my most hallowed name.
For the distance between us isn’t real at all.
It’s love. It’s everywhere. And it lasts for eternity.
I seal this with a kiss. I place it upon the palm of my hand.
I hold it out and gently blow it your way.
I love you…my dear child.
Always smiling at you,
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Your Proud Papa
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—Howard Hain
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You are my rock
Upon the rock You built Your Church
At Your death the rock was split in two
They laid You lifeless in the rocky tomb
And rolled the rock to seal the light of day
I am Your rock
Upon me You build Your Church
At Your death I split in two
You lay lifeless in my lifeless tomb
My rocky heart seals the light of day
In secret to Father we do pray
Our stillness knows that He is God
No longer statues we arise
And throw aside what we once wore
Total darkness and yet we see
Clearly only one way to go
Your promise lights the way
To restore what You foretold
Same as in the beginning
God and in His image
His creation
His masterpiece
His Son and His brother
The One known as The Word and the one called man
We both enter the garden
As the rock is rolled away
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—Howard Hain
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Mary Cassatt, “Breakfast in Bed”, 1897
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Lord, a new year is upon us.
Help us.
Help us to be grateful.
Gracious and grateful.
Gracious, grateful, and giving.
You give and you take away.
Nothing but Your love is truly ours.
For love You give and love You never take away.
Love only love.
Love just love.
What is it, Lord? What is Your love?
A million answers.
Each of us could probably come up with a thousand.
It’s times such as these that You are not silent, although You don’t seem to say a word.
You answer. You have and will always continue to do so.
You gave Your Only Begotten Son.
A tiny babe. A beautiful child. A strong young man. A fearless leader. A lamb to be slaughtered.
You gave the Tree of Life.
You threw it into the River.
You made all that is bitter sweet.
You gave the Sign of the Cross.
You wrote Your name upon our foreheads.
You gave us a mother, and common brothers and sisters, and holy angels and saints, all of whom we are free to call friends.
Yes, You gave us love.
But what is it, Lord?
We know love exits and we know it does not come from ourselves.
Even for those who say You don’t exist.
To them we could point at the ocean, or the sky—the sun, the moon, and the stars—or even a simple common everyday tree—a single leaf of grass.
“Who made them?”, we can ask.
“Who but God alone?”
Who but You, Lord God, Who willed not to be alone?
You willed love.
You willed Yourself.
Proof of Your existence is You don’t need it.
For nothing will prove You, for nothing can disprove You.
For the love You send is not only born, crucified, and risen, it also ascends.
Above all knowledge.
Into Heaven.
Pure and simple.
Knowledge.
Knowledge that You love us.
You truly love us.
Little old us.
That is what You love.
The object of Your love.
The product of Your love.
We are Your love.
Thank You, Lord.
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—Howard Hain
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Luke 2,41-52
For most people, Christmas is over– the music’s stopped; Santa Claus is gone from the malls. The decorations are down and put away. It’s over.
But in church Christmas isn’t over. We’re still singing carols and continue to celebrate as we think about what it means when we say “our God was made visible.”
Today’s the feast of the Holy Family. The Word was made flesh, and as the child of Mary and Joseph Jesus was part of a family in the small town of Nazareth in hills of Galilee.
For one thing, families then were extended families or clans, living close together and working side by side. Archeological excavations in Nazareth and Capernaum (pictures below) make that clear. Families worked together in the fields or in business, they ate together and moved together, as they still do in parts of the Middle East and elsewhere today.
It’s safe to say that nuclear families didn’t exist then. A nuclear family– mother, father and children– is a modern form of family life. Mary, Joseph and the Child Jesus were not all by themselves in a small house in Nazareth. Rather, Jesus was raised in an extended family where grandfathers and grandmothers, uncles, aunts and cousins lived together and were involved in bringing him up.
That doesn’t take away the part Mary and Joseph played in his upbringing, of course. They weren’t props, standing by while angels brought him up. Some of the apocryphal gospels – early stories about Jesus which the church rejected – seem to say that. One story describes the Child Jesus forming the figure of a bird from clay, then breathing on it, and instantly it becomes a living bird and flies away. Stories like that presented him exercising miraculous powers as a child.
The church rejected those stories because they gave a false picture of Jesus growing up. He “was subject” to Mary and Joseph, the gospel of Luke says. He grew up in their care as an ordinary child would.
Like mothers and fathers everywhere, they saw to his needs, they held him in their arms, fed him, clothed him, stayed up at night when he was sick. They taught him his first words, guided his first steps, nudged him along this way and that.
They brought him to church–the synagogue, the temple–as we see in today’s gospel from Luke. They instructed him in his tradition. They taught him to pray, interpreted events for him, listened to his questions, encouraged him over and over. They had their misunderstandings, as today’s gospel indicates. In fact, they influenced his life.
Yes, angels were there, but at a distance. Mary and Joseph and that larger family and village around him raised the Child.
Today’s feast of the Holy Family takes in the years of Jesus’ childhood and early adult life called his “Hidden Life.” His years in that nondescript town among those ordinary people were truly hidden, yet were they less important than his Public Life, the few years he taught and did great miracles, suffered and died and rose from the dead? In those hidden years “he humbled himself.” A hidden life is important; it’s what mostly characterizes life in a family.
We need to think about family life today, because it’s in trouble. For one thing, the nuclear family– father, mother, children– is in trouble. I read some disturbing statistics recently. In every state in our country, families where children have two parents have declined significantly in the last 10 years. One of three children live in a home without a father. Almost 5 million children live in a home without a mother. A single mother may have an income of $24,000. Two parents are likely to have an income significantly greater.
What can we do? How can we help? Feasts like the Holy Family focus our attention on important things. They remind us what’s important in God’s eyes. The feast of the Holy Family focuses on the family. It’s important, it says. At the same time, it tells us God’s grace will be ours when we work to make families go and when we support them all we can. God points to family life today. It’s vitally important in our world.
Rembrandt, “The Angel Appearing to the Shepherds”, 1634
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Now there were shepherds in that region living in the fields and keeping the night watch over their flock. The angel of the Lord appeared to them and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were struck with great fear.
—Luke 2:8-9
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Perhaps the scariest thing to those of us who cling tightly to the things of the world is to accept the job that the Lord assigns us.
Oh, how so many of us are so quick to long for greater adventure!
Yet, when it comes to those humble, little shepherds to whom the angel of the Lord appeared, we are perhaps even quicker to long to be one of them—sitting quietly upon a gentle hillside, effortlessly tending to a passive flock, while the always-full moon provides a soft, ever-so-appropriate illumination from above.
But we are liars. For there’s nothing less romantic in each one of our daily lives, or more mundane. We simply have to be honest, or at least consistent. It all depends on how we look at it. If we see the shepherds in such a delicate light then we also need to see ourselves in the same. For before the angel appears, the shepherds were hardly posing for picturesque landscapes. Perhaps it is for this very reason—their realness, their authenticity, their holy simplicity—that the Lord chose them to be present when He revealed His glory.
It is exciting. We have a wonderful choice, then. Either our “boring” lives make us just the kind of people to whom God prefers to reveal Himself, or our lives are a lot more “exciting” than we ever imagined. Either way, what is vital to making such a decision is true sincerity and genuine gratitude. We need to thank God for who He has made us, for where He has placed us, and for what type of task He has assigned us.
A faithful, humble heart dreams and believes and sees great things among the most ordinary circumstances. Just look at the young virgin and the upright carpenter to whom the shepherds “went in haste” to find in a stable, adoring a child born within the company of the “lowest” of men.
If we spend our time dreaming of being someone else, living somewhere else, and doing something else, we miss the opportunity of being exactly who God intends us to be—and when that happens—we are always in the wrong place, at the wrong time, and most tragically, doing that which matters very little.
For to be the first on the scene, the first to “lay hold”, the first to adore the New Born King, is as good as it gets—even for those whose “normal existence” isn’t standing around all alone—day after day in the scorching sun or biting cold, while picking fleas from matted-down fleece or scaring off hungry wolves.
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The angel said to them, “Do not be afraid; for behold, I proclaim to you good news of great joy that will be for all the people…”
So they went in haste and found Mary and Joseph, and the infant lying in the manger. When they saw this, they made known the message that had been told them about this child. All who heard it were amazed by what had been told them by the shepherds.
Then the shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all they had heard and seen, just as it had been told to them.”
—Luke, Chapter 2:10,16-18,20
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—Howard Hain
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Utagawa Hiroshige, “Titmouse and Camellias (right), Sparrow and Wild Roses (center), and Black-naped Oriole and Cherry Blossoms (left)”, ca. 1833
Lord, You are good.
Truly Good.
You are a great promise.
You are as good as Your Word.
You set free and You restore.
You truly make all things new.
I have seen great deeds.
Only Your hand can accomplish.
Within spaces.
So big and so small.
I have seen you in the sky and in the bird.
I have heard You cry and felt You shake.
I feel Your smile.
This very moment.
Good morning, Father.
You are so very good.
You are God.
And You alone.
Thank You for teaching me.
For showing me how to be free.
By asking only one thing.
Each and every moment.
What is Your will?
I need know nothing more.
I need not see, nor hear, nor feel, nor sense anything else.
I need not understand, nor remember, nor plan.
I need not desire nor will more than Your will itself.
I am.
Here.
To know.
To love.
To serve.
You.
And You alone.
That is Your will.
Your will is You.
One and the same.
Father, Son, Holy Spirit.
Holy Mother Church.
Holy Angels.
Holy Saints.
Cloud of Witnesses.
Help me, Lord God.
Maker of Heaven and Earth.
To love You more and more each day.
In all Your creation.
Every bit of Your handiwork.
All for Your sake.
Simple. Clear. Honest. Pure.
A sparrow just up at dawn.
Tweet…tweet…tweet…
I hear Your will knocking at my door.
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—Howard Hain
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http://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/56918
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The Victor's Place 