The Family Foundation School Catholic Community Bulletin
Pauca Verba (a few words)
Next Thursday, August 6, is the Feast of the Transfiguration of the Lord Jesus. It is also the anniversary remembering the dropping of the first atomic bomb on Hiroshima – followed a few days later by the bombing of Nagasaki. Jesus is made radiant white on the mountaintop before Peter, James and John. Moses and the Prophet Elijah appear as well. The heavenly voice of the Father is heard instructing us to listen carefully to Jesus, God’s beloved Son.
Jesus has predicted the terrors of Good Friday and to encourage them he gives them this marvelous glimpse into Easter’s rejoicing. Don’t we need this vision today? So lost in the terrors that surround us – uncertainty about the future, the welfare of our families, the threats to goodness we encounter seemingly everywhere, troubled by our own weakness. Come to Mass next Thursday eager to celebrate this feast of light and hope!
And prepare to come to Mass on this anniversary remembering the untold destruction and death of war. Hear Pope Benedict XVI as he prepared to return to Rome, departing from Israel. This is why we need a pope: a leader who will speak to the whole world!
“No more bloodshed. No more fighting. No more terrorism. No more war.”
(Notice too: the pope, who has many enemies, speaks boldly to the whole world, while here in our school, we’re so afraid to speak up about so much.)
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“From the beginning our God has been about the work of saving us, of asking us Where are you? (God’s first words to Adam and Eve after they had eaten from the tree.) God has been about the work of trying to draw us closer once again to himself and to assure us of his presence and intimacy in spite of us not knowing our sin and reluctance to be touched and held by the holy Unutterable One. In God’s presence no words are needed anymore. The face of Jesus has been give to us to say it all: Mercy, mercy.” (Sister Megan McKenna)
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The word religion comes from the Latin: religio – to rebind. Religion has been given to us to rebind us – reconnect us – after the things that separate us. To rebind us to God, to community and relationships. To rebind us to the truth (who for Christians is a person: Jesus Christ, the Lord!) To rebind us to the search and meaning. To rebind us to the things of the soul.
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Young women: Do you know that the Taliban forbids the education of females in Afghanistan? How do you approach your opportunity to become educated? What an Afghani girl would do for the chance to go to school!
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“Men don’t share in women’s dreams the way women share in men’s dreams.” Marlo Thomas
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In his autobiography, actor Michael J. Fox describes sobriety as living without any anesthesia. He remembers his wife, Tracy, speaking to him the morning after his last night of drinking: “Is this what you want? THIS is what you want to be?”
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These are the words that restore us to God: “I have sinned.” Confession anyone?!
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Remembering our summertime graduate pilgrimages to Lourdes in the Pyrenees Mountains of France some years ago: Lourdes, where the Virgin Mary appeared eighteen times to St. Bernadette in 1858.
At Lourdes, there is no hiding, no silly shame or reservation. People hold candles in the air. People press upon the rock of the grotto where Our Lady stood and Bernadette prayed. People undress to enter the water of the spring. People walk in enormous processions and sing out without fear or hesitation.
There is a kind of religion that is worn on the sleeve, we say. It’s phony; for others to see. It’s dramatic, so to impress others. And then there’s religion that flows from an unashamed and pure heart; lived only for the love of God, because there is joy found in God!
