A Few Words

The Family Foundation School Catholic Community Bulletin

Pauca Verba (a few words)

Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity

God is one, but within God’s inner life there is a Trinity of Persons.

God is family, relationship, community.

It’s a doctrine – a teaching.

But not a teaching to believe in isolation: like a school-book fact.

It’s a teaching to transform my lifestyle.

That my life would be characterized by new relationships:

New friendships, peace-making with enemies,

the overcoming of alienation and estrangement.

The end of exploitation and dis-engagement and

the marginalization of people.

The welcoming of the littlest and most vulnerable – beginning with the child, the handicapped, the “disposable.”

Get it?!

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Why confess sins? Because I can’t hope for a cure unless I disclose or declare my illness to the doctor. Father Damian deVeuster served the lepers on the island of Molokai in Hawaii for many years. Of course, once he went to the island he knew he would never see family and friends again. He was left alone on the island with his diseased people even before he contracted leprosy himself. When supplies were delivered or more lepers to be consigned to the island no one would get off the delivery ship. Everything was just dumped off-shore. Father Damian would row a small boat out to the great delivery ship and a priest would stand at the front of the ship while Father Damian made his confession, yelling his sins up to the listening priest. But everyone else on the ship listened too: mocking, laughing. So if Father Damian can confess his sins in so public a way, surely we can find our way to the solitude and privacy of the confessional here and in repentance and humility come to hear the words of absolution. Some people say: “I confess my sins to God directly.” Maybe. But sacraments are experiences (seven of them – seven – the biblical number of fullness and completion). Think of your life – isn’t it all about experiencing, event, celebrated moment? A sports arena, field or court. A table with a great meal. A dance-floor. A confession room.

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Franz Jagerstatter was an Austrian farmer, devoted husband and father and a devout Catholic. He was executed at age 36 on August 9, 1943, at the Berlin-Brandenburg prison for refusing to serve in the Nazi army. Before taking this stand Jagerstatter had consulted both his pastor and the local bishop, who instructed him to do his duty and to obey the law – an instruction that violated his conscience. A solitary witness. Some of his notebooks, letters and essays from his prison months have been recovered and recently published. Listen!

1. St. Joseph is a magnificent model of silent and prompt obedience. We recognize true Christians less by their words than by their actions. (Matthew 1:18ff)

2. Christ demanded a religion of conviction and action.

3. Whoever wants to avoid bad action must rein in human desires. Un-ordered desires grow into lustful glances. The lustful glances prompt evil actions. (Matthew 5:27ff)

4. We should pursue our rights, and yet love of neighbor is a higher value than cold rights. (Matthew 5:38ff)

5. Love of enemies is not a weakness of personal character but a heroic power of the soul and the imitation of the divine model. (Matthew 5:43ff)

6. Calmly enacting God’s love accomplishes the most over a period of time because it flows out of one’s inner sources, not out of a perverted self-seeking or compulsion. (Matthew 6:1ff)