Notes For the Holidays

The times I get the largest number of comments on my blog are the times I write about incidents with my dad. (Nearly all of the comments, by the way, are sent to me directly so they don’t get posted- but please, post them!) People have been able to identify with many of those incidents. With that in mind, I offer this modern-day list of beatitudes, for dealing with the elderly. I heard this on youtube; perhaps you have heard it also. If you have the opportunity, take these into consideration as you gather with family over the holidays:
Blessed are they who understand
my faltering steps and shaking hand.
Blessed are they who know my ears today
must strain to catch the things they say.
Blessed are they who seem to know
that my eyes are dim and my wits are slow.
Blessed are they who looked away
when I spilled the coffee at table today.
Blessed are they with a cheery smile
who take the time to chat for a while.
Blessed are they who know the ways
to bring back memories of yesterdays.
Blessed are they who make it known
that I’m love, respected, and not alone.

May you have a blessed Christmas, remembering that Christ can be born again into this world only if you incarnate him in your own life.

THE VIEWS EXPRESSED ON THIS BLOG ARE MINE ALONE
AND DO NOT NECESSARILY REFLECT THOSE OF MY EMPLOYER.

What Did You Do?

I was watching a short video the other day by Michael Himes, a priest on the faculty of Boston College, and he was talking about Matthew 25, the last judgment. He began by pointing out that the great medieval cathedrals of Europe almost all have the same depiction above their doors. It is not the nativity, nor the crucifixion, nor the resurrection, nor Jesus teaching, nor any of those pericopes we remember so vividly from scripture, but Matthew 25, the description of the last judgment. Everyone had to pass under that depiction before entering the churches. At the time of the last judgment, according to Matthew 25, Jesus will not ask us how much theology we studied, or how many religious books we read, or how many church services we attended; we will simply be asked one question: how did you treat the least of your brethren? This is the criterion for salvation – what did we do with what we knew. Did our study of scripture or the hours on our knees lead to anything beyond ourselves? -because if not, we have mistaken the message. What did you do for the least of your brethren? How did you reach beyond yourself today to hurting humanity? Do you live a practical piety? It is a deceptively simple criterion, one which makes no distinctions between the most learned and most humble, and yet it is everything. What did you do…what did you do…what did you do for those most in need?
THE VIEWS EXPRESSED ON THIS BLOG ARE MINE ALONE AND DO NOT NECESSARILY REFLECT THOSE OF MY EMPLOYER.

Uncoupled

We had a crowd around the table for Thanksgiving – some family, and two couples who were friends. Among the family was my 95-year-old dad, hard of hearing and legally blind. One of the first things he said as he sat at his place was that someone must have laid his watch down and forgotten it. (Dad mistook the napkin ring for a watch.) People laughed and told him what it was. Dad didn’t laugh; he didn’t know one of the couples at the table and was probably embarrassed. I can’t recall that he said another thing throughout the meal. I thought about it later and thought that had it been me, I would have talked with my husband about it later that evening in bed – pillow talk – and shared my embarrassment with him, and he would have told me to forget about it – it didn’t mean anything. The point I’m getting at is that people who are alone, who have lost a spouse and who now walk, perhaps for the first time, uncoupled in the world, have no one with whom to share their secrets. I have thought that often since mom died six years ago, when I thought dad would be about to say something but then didn’t. And now as we come into the most difficult time of year for those who are alone, I think about it again. When you’re alone (and without a BFF!), you have no one with whom to share your secrets – big ones and silly ones, ones bursting for a tell and ones that are plain gossip. There’s just something so wondrous about the companionship of a partner – the intimacy of that relationship – which encourages every manner of sharing. Losing that, if you have ever had it, must be devastating. If you know people who have been recently widowed or divorced, this would probably be a good time of the year to be especially aware of including them. It certainly won’t take away their pain or loneliness, but it may lessen the feeling of emptiness just enough to ease them through the holidays.

The Toll of Living

This Sunday in the Catholic lectionary we meet one of my favorite characters in all of scripture – John the Baptist. He appears in the desert out of nowhere and preaches a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. Author John Shea talks about needing to be cleansed from the “toll of living,” and the appropriateness of the desert as the backdrop for this endeavor. The desert – a place of total quiet, solitude, where one has nothing to distract but oneself. -and what an interesting phrase – to think about one’s toll of living. What is the toll which has been assessed on my life for the compromises I make, for the pride which directs many of my comments and actions, for the greed which drives my desires? How am I misshapen by this toll? And what am I going to do about it? You see the toll is not the transgression – it is how the transgression forms me. Who have I become as a result of the daily decisions I make and the actions I take? And how far away from whom I want to be, am I really? That’s a good meditation as we make our way through the season of preparation.