The Hope of the World is Our Hope

Mercy is an incredible thing.

During Christmas we remember Jesus coming among us. He comes for the poor, and for the Gentiles, and for Israel--for the whole world. He comes to seek out and save what is lost. He comes for sinners.

Jesus loves the worst sinners, the people we would consider disgusting. He has not given up on them. He loves them, He goes out in search of them, He gives Himself completely for them.

He wants sinners. He wants the most awful people, the disgraceful people, the people we don't want anything to do with. He wants to change their hearts by His grace, to bring them to repentance and conversion, to heal them, to forgive them, and to enable them to love Him. He wants them to be with Him forever. His heart burns with love for them: the ones we look upon as gross, horrible people--not just "ordinary sinners" but really bad people.

This should be a cause for great hope. For who among us looks in the mirror and sees a face with no cause for shame? The hope of the world is our hope. Jesus wants to awaken in us and draw forth from our hearts a true sorrow for our sins, and then He wants to fill our hearts with His love and transform us and make us beautiful.

On the Cross, in the Church, in the sacraments, and in these beautiful days of Christmas that we celebrate, He shows how He has given Himself to us, and how He longs for us.

He wants us to pray and to open our hearts to Him in trust. We must pray, "Lord, make me the person You will me to be. Shape me, change me, lead me. I believe in Your love for me. I trust in You."

God Seeks Us Always, but He Doesn't Force Our Love

There are many reasons why people try to escape from God.

Sometimes you just have your own agenda. You prefer your own ideas to the wisdom and love of the God who created the whole universe. You think you know better than Him regarding what you need to be happy.

Or you're just bitter. You're angry with God because of pain or the deprivations of your life. Maybe you prefer to be at a distance from Him. You want the cold solitude that lets you hold onto your own misery.

You don't want to pray because you want to avoid God, to forget Him, to run away from Him and His mercy that would change your life. And you are a free person. You can say "no" to God.

But wait... you really don’t want His mercy? Well, watch out then, because He is going to come looking for you.

Where are you going to try to hide? He is, you know, infinitely clever. He will "outwit" you. He will write straight with all your crooked lines.

But God is a lover, not a bully. Love cannot be forced; it is freedom itself. Thus the mystery of evil entails the real possibility that we might succeed in escaping from His loving embrace forever. But we will not become free and independent by escaping from God’s love. Outside of God’s love there is nothing good, true, or beautiful.

How awful.

So lift the cover from your hiding place. Turn to Him. If you are still running away, then you haven’t yet gone too far. Turn back and cry out to Him. Ask for His help, His mercy.

God helps those who ask him. He even helps those who run away, as long as they don’t refuse to come home. He helps those who do not push Him away. He helps those who have been hiding from Him, if they are willing to let themselves be found.

Do not forget God. Let yourself be found.

A Force of Nature

What I sound like to my kids.

In the past four years I have written and written, here on this blog and on other media platforms. And though I'm not teaching in the classroom, I am always ready to talk about things that interest me and others, i.e. to have a conversation. I'm a pretty good listener (over the years I've become much better at really listening). But words always seem to be at hand, and if others are interested and listening I will talk. I will talk and talk and talk long beyond exhaustion.

I have an implacable desire to express myself, and to communicate the things that I experience and learn. The energy to shape words (whether writing or speaking) is like a force of nature in me.

And like everything in my nature, it is ambivalent.

It is the energy of seeking the truth, and of the desire to encourage others in the search for truth.

But it is also the energy of a show-off who wants to be admired, a clown who craves laughter, an acrobat who hungers for applause; it comes, in part, from the vacuum inside me that is desperately insecure, that wants approval again and again, that wants to take the feeling of being appreciated, consume it, and demand more.

It is human to want to be appreciated. But for me this desire is swollen and throbbing and itching in a way that can never be scratched.

I have so much to offer. I am intelligent, learned, experienced in life, and generous toward others. I have a pretty good sense of humor. I am ardent, earnest, devoted, intense, and sincere. But I am also vain, proud, and overly dramatic. And I am insecure, emotionally fragile, anxious, stressed out, overwhelmed. I overdo everything (just look at this list!).

Why am I this way?

The consequences of original sin, of course, are a fundamental factor in the division, distortion, and conflict that everyone faces in life. For me this is augmented by genetic predispositions, physical and mental illness, and the inherent psychological strengths and imbalance of an intelligent and creative personality.

Then I have 52 years of my own concrete human experience -- my (authentic though inadequate) love for God and others, my few accomplishments, my many sins, and all my struggling, failing, suffering, being hurt, and seeking God but too often failing to trust in Him.

There is this world of mistrust inside me, fortified with many weapons and many defenses, stubbornly persisting for no real reason.

I need to be changed, profoundly, in ways I don't even know; to be stripped down, remolded, and forged anew. Sometimes it feels like this is the deep and mysterious truth of what has been happening to me in recent years, in all of these amplified sufferings and confusion and deeper joys too.

A force of nature being forged into something new: this is a process that takes a long time.

It is the work that Jesus is accomplishing in me through the Holy Spirit. I try to work "with Him," but above all I have to surrender my self to His work.

He knows what needs to be accomplished.

We All Need Forgiveness

One word that must never be forgotten: Forgiveness. We all need forgiveness.

In these late days of January, we hold up the dignity of every human being, the uniqueness and preciousness of every human life. We cry out against the violence of our "throwaway culture" where human persons are treated like things and the most intimate relationships of human love are reduced to mere convenient arrangements between autonomous egos.

We seek justice. We hope to make a difference. We want to build up the good. But realism compels us to acknowledge that the wounds are very deep. They have many origins and many levels of affliction. People are wounded and bleeding, and what is pouring out of them is the blood of the human spirit, the resources of human vitality, hope, attachment to real life, capacity to love.

Terrible wounds. How can they possibly be healed and restored? Where is forgiveness to be found?

There is a brokenness that we see manifested in the tragic violence of abortion, that destroys innocent human life, separates mothers from their own children, and robs our society of the awareness that human dignity is rooted in the gift of God's creative love. Brokenness is manifest in euthanasia, in the brutal neglect of the poor, in pervasive contentiousness and bitter conflict, in war as a way of life.

Yet this brokenness afflicts all of us in different ways. We all try to withdraw from other persons or push them away from ourselves. We try to escape from those we are called to love. We want to evade precisely those relationships that are most real, that are constructive, challenging, and promising; those relationships that are mysteriously given but that can only live from committed and responsible freedom.

We withdraw from the promise of real love because we are afraid to give ourselves. We are afraid of the risk, the loss of ourselves in giving, the loss of a "control" that we think we can keep by our own power.

We are afraid of suffering.

We are all human beings, strange and broken and unable to put ourselves back together. And a great portion of this fragility and incapacity and anguish is not our fault. We suffer already, from physiological and psychological limitations that we inherit, from the pain of our own experiences, from illnesses, from all the wounds inflicted by the failures of others.

Yet we also know that our freedom still lives within this debilitated frame. We know that our freedom has been summoned by the promise of love, by the beauty and attraction of a fulfillment that is mysteriously made possible, by a hope that we cannot extinguish.

And we know that sometimes, to some extent, we have freely chosen to hide in the shadows of ourselves. We have refused to take the next step on the path that the light indicates to us. We have chosen to draw back into darkness.

Something of the brokenness that each of us suffers right now is our own fault. In the immensely complicated fabric of every human life there are many events and circumstances, but there is also the willful misuse of freedom. There is sin.

We have all sinned.

We all need forgiveness.

We are able to recognize so many genuine excuses for our failures, and these are factors of our lives that need attention, compassion, and healing. All of this is important, but it is not enough. We need to acknowledge and perhaps feel the touch of the unbearable weight of our own responsibility, our yielding to weakness, indulgence, distraction and our taking up of the weapons of destruction of ourselves and others. We need to acknowledge that we really are sinners.

Each one of us needs to examine his or her conscience and seek forgiveness for our sins.

When we bring this ultimate vulnerability into the open and raise it up to the One who has created us and who sustains our being, then we can discover the wonder of mercy.

God's response to our sins is Jesus. God gives Himself, and the abyss of His love is infinitely "deeper" than any of our wounds. He can heal our brokenness if we turn to Him.

If we open ourselves up, concretely, to the forgiveness of God, it will become a radiance within us, a witness -- within our wounded and broken and healing humanity -- to the gift of redeeming love that He offers to everyone. We will become instruments of His mercy.

Then our witness to the world becomes a witness to the truth in love. It is able to address with realism all the desperation and all the evil in our society because it does not condemn other human persons. Rather it is a witness of hope.

When we are deeply forgiven, we can communicate to others the ardent desire of the heart of Jesus to forgive their sins and bring healing. When we witness from within the awareness of our own poverty and total dependence upon His mercy, then it is that mercy that shines through us.

The witness to God's mercy and love is already the beginning of something new in the world. It awakens hope in hearts that God wants to touch; it brings that hope to people who may have never known it.

We all need forgiveness. People in our world today desperately need forgiveness. They don't know where to look for it. They may not even know it's possible. Yet they need it. We all share this need.

Let us not be afraid to be forgiven, to let our lives show how God responds to our need with His loving embrace.

Then He can use our hearts to extend the inexhaustible reach of His mercy and the promise of His forgiveness to others. Love and healing will grow in the world.

Our Father eagerly longs to forgive every person and to clothe them in robes of healing. Turn to Him. Ask Him for the grace of true sorrow for your sins. Ask Him to work within your heart, to change what needs changing in you.

The Father has already answered that "asking" -- He has answered it beyond all measure. He has sent His Son to dwell with us. Jesus. His Holy Spirit works in us and changes us, opening up surprising new places in our hearts from which we can turn away from our sins, and turn to Jesus with trust. He will make it possible for us to change, to want His forgiveness.

It may seem impossible. That doesn't matter. All things are possible with God. Ask Him. Keep asking. Never give up asking. He will do it.

O Lord, convert my heart! Change what needs changing in me. Forgive me for my sins!

Jesus, I trust in You.

Confession: A New Beginning in Grace

Last week I wrote about the sacrament of Reconciliation, and how great a gift it is for anyone who wants to live a faithful Christian life. I recently revised that post a bit; you can click on the title to see some new reflections woven in with the old: (Confession: Encountering The Mercy of Jesus). I also thought it would be worth reflecting on that more radical effect of this sacrament: the forgiveness of serious sins and a new beginning in grace brought about by the mercy of God. This is neither a treatise nor even an exhaustive reflection. Its a blog post. Here are my thoughts:

We think of confession primarily as the sacrament that restores the life of grace to baptized Catholics who have lost it through the spiritual death of serious sin (i.e. mortal sin). And this is indeed true. How many of us have wept with gratitude when being reconciled to God after foolishly abandoning Him in pursuit of something that seemed so good, but turned out to be false, bitter, and empty. We abandoned God's love for our own folly or pride or self-indulgence. But God never stops loving us, and He calls us to come and let our hearts be filled with His love once more.

There are so many people of recent generations who were born and baptized Catholic, but lacked the catechesis that forms the eyes, the mind and the heart to recognize Christ in the Church as the real truth of life. So they went their own ways (sometimes for many years), and eventually found themselves cheated by the false promises of sin, and trapped in an ugly and self-destructive life.

For long lost "cradle" Catholics (and other baptized Christians who run from Christ and travel many roads, but in the end find their way to the fullness of Catholic faith), the sacrament of Reconciliation is the place where they find God's mercy, and where they can leave their heavy burdens. The sacrament of Reconciliation is the open arms of a father who has never ceased seeking and longing for his child to return home.

Herein lies its magnificent testimony to God's inexhaustible mercy and love given by Christ through the Church. We can do more than just beg for God's mercy in private prayer (although we should do this also, so that the Spirit will lead us). We can go to a place, and receive that mercy now.

Many of course fear that they cannot leave behind their sinful habits. They know that their struggles have only led to failure. The problem is that they are struggling by themselves.

Go to confession and let Christ take on the struggle with you and in you. Trust in Him. It may take time and you may fall again. Go back again. You are not alone. You have a home now. Let the priest guide you. God does not "run out" of mercy. Through the grace of the sacrament, Jesus will forge an new freedom in you.

Go to confession today. Go during the time when confessions are offered. It can be a very simple thing. Or else, call a Catholic church and arrange to see a priest. He is but a poor instrument of Christ, but he is a guarantee that Christ is here for you, right now. Let Jesus love you. Come home.

I have known in my own life the beauty and the peace of "coming home." I'm far from perfect (see the previous post), but I know where to find Jesus. I know that I need Him. I know that nothing in this world can compare to the embrace of His mercy.

Confession: Encountering The Mercy of Jesus

I finally had the chance to go to confession, fulfilling the desire I had last week on my birthday (see post dated January 4). I am 50 years old. I made my first confession when I was 7 years old. A lot of confessions. A lot of mercy.

It is a wonder, really. Here is the same Jesus who said to the paralytic, "your sins are forgiven." Now this same Person says this surprising and seemingly impossible thing to me two thousand years later, through the ministry of a priest.

It is a sacrament, a mystery of God's love that happens at a specific time and a specific place; a gift of grace that I receive in a historical way, from Jesus through a man who extends the priesthood of Jesus and His saving love through all space and time so that He reaches me and my particular sins. His healing reaches down to all my ingratitude and forgetfulness, which I try to express to Him in a particular way, with particular words.

It is an encounter between my fragile conscience and the Infinite Mercy of God.

I try to go to confession every month. But not because I think I have broken my relationship with God by grave sin every month. I don't have to go every month. So what's the point of my going to regular confession?

First of all, I hardly trust in my own assessment of my soul, however honest and thorough it may be. "But who can detect all his errors? From hidden faults acquit me. From presumption restrain your servant and let it not rule me. Then shall I be blameless, clean from grave sin" (Psalm 19[B]:12-13). Wretched man that I am. I throw myself upon the mercy of God! In this sacrament, however, we are not required to produce an impossible self-analysis. We are called upon to accuse ourselves as best we can, and trust in the merciful love of Jesus.

Of course, trials and temptations abound, and I know that I am as capable as Peter (or Judas) of betraying Jesus. "He that thinks himself to stand, let him take heed lest he fall" (1 Corinthians 10:12).  I beg that the Lord sustain me in His mercy. I pray that He give me the grace to be faithful to Him.

With trust in the mercy of Jesus, I make my monthly confession. It is what is sometimes called a "devotional" confession. I think it is important to emphasize the value of this sacrament not only to restore the life of grace when lost through serious sin, but also for those who are walking with Christ, and living the life of grace. Such persons are far from "coherent" in their Christian lives. They need the grace of this sacrament to heal and strengthen them against falling away from Him, to preserve them from becoming lukewarm, and just to let Jesus go to work on all the weird stuff that still distracts and preoccupies their lives.

I love regular confession. I know that it is such a blessing to take out of myself and give to Jesus the stubborn mistakes, the childish impatience, the petty irritations, the mediocre vanity, the laziness, the nippy little rash judgments, misperceptions, and self-satisfaction that constitute 99% of my daily life.

Its true that I don't have to confess any of these things. They're not grave sins. But there's not a whole lot of positive stuff going on with my actions either. I still live mostly for myself, afraid to go beyond my own limits. God has given Himself to me, but where is my love? Why is it so small?

So much of me still sleeps in superficial preoccupations. God's life in me is hidden away, buried, constrained by all this nonsense. I am alive in Christ, but wounded. Even when I want to walk, I limp badly.

If there is anything -- anything at all -- that has real value in my life, it comes from the grace of Jesus. He really does act and renew my particular life, in such a way that it is clear to me that I must never let go of Him. But consider what He still has to work with:

Add all my misshapen semi-habits to aspire to do God's will, to be true, good and beautiful, along with some not-so-good character flaws, a quirky personality, a mind always thinking all over the place, some poetic insight and some skill for turning a phrase, a life experience with rough patches, an empathetic disposition, vast gaps of emotional immaturity, and of course a neurologically dysfunctional brain, other health problems, disability, insomnia, and just the ordinary "weight" the human condition. And I can't even begin to understand all the stuff that is going on in the "subconscious" (or whatever it is), that vast murky underworld beneath my awareness. What we have here in John Janaro is a big mess! 

And I judge other people? Its preposterous. We really have to love people. That doesn't mean we ignore when they are being self-destructive and destructive of others. It means we see them with love. Even when we know what's true and real, we don't know all that's going on inside that other person. I gather from my own experience that the inner world of every human being is basically pretty freaky. Jesus needs our love to touch deep places in the lives of others that we will never understand. If we are given some of that bread that is the Word of God, and we see someone hungry, we share it, not by bending down and offering a few crumbs, but by being with them, and sharing both the gift and our common poverty. If they turn away from us, we still have to stay -- as best we can -- and share their suffering.

For we are all poor, poor, poor human beings. Whatever our circumstances, we all have hearts made for God. We are poor and hungry and invested with a desire that refuses to die even when it turns to desperation. We are wounded and, somewhere in the midst of all our freakiness, we are longing for healing.

I am a poor Christian. How can I be a witness? Certainly not by pointing to myself and saying, "look how great I am." But Someone Else has come into my life and awakened an unconquerable hope that my poverty might be transformed into humility and love. I don't know how this will reach its fulfillment, but this hope engenders trust in Him, moment by moment, and I begin to find healing. This is something that can become visible in my poor world.

Back to the sacrament of Reconciliation: Here is a sacrament that nourishes hope in a poor man. Here is a sacrament where I can encounter the healing Christ. He wants His love to fill my whole life. This healing and transformation of my self is a slow process, but still God wants to accomplish it. In this sacrament, He offers healing and strength, as a gift that comes forth, in a specific yet ineffable manner, from the glorified life of Christ that remains concretely present in the world -- in my world. It is something real. It is a gift of His love. It is a sacrament.

Here is where I bring my poverty, because I am a poor Christian full of hope. Here I find the promise of God's mercy, the redeeming grace of Jesus, the outpouring of the Spirit, and a real step on the path of communion with Him and with my brothers and sisters in the Church, and every person that shares the path of life with me. I pray that I might rejoice again and again in this gift, this mercy, so that the joy of His life will grow in me, and become more visible and worthwhile to the others who live in "my world."

Mary is a "Yes" to God

Statue of Mary at Mission San Juan
Bautista, California (six months ago!)

I love these days. These are "Mary's days," beginning with this great celebration of the beginning, of that radical moment when God did something new. In the silence of St. Anne's womb, the new creation began, the definitive victory of Divine grace burst into history for the first time.

From the very beginning, Mary is all about grace. She reveals the love of Jesus, the power of God to change everything. She is called to be the Mother of the Word who dwells among us, to "embrace God"  totally and entirely because it was from her concrete, human historical reality that He would take flesh. From the moment of her conception, Mary is nothing but a "yes" to God.

He knows that the "yes" of Mary goes all the way to the Cross. That "yes," by God's redeeming grace, fills Mary totally, from the beginning.

She is also called to be close to each one of us, with all of our sins. Because she is without sin, there is a place in her heart for all of us sinners.

There is no limit to the "yes" that she says to her Son, and to each one of us.

O Mary, conceived without sin, pray for us who have recourse to you.