What do You Like About Your Life? Part 1

Have you ever watched the Youtube video called, "Jessica's Affirmation?" My students watched it today and then made their lists of everything they like. What a powerful experience. Some of the students even shared their list with their classmates. I was given permission to share the following 6th graders' lists with you. I think you can easily understand why I love to get up every morning and teach these beautiful children of God!

Katie S.

• I like Holy Name
• I like balloons
• I like birthday parties
• I like birthday cakes
• I like presents
• I like school

Josie B.

I like my...

• Family
• School
• Friends
• House
• Teachers
• Myself
• God
• The World

Chris T.

I like my...

• Mom
• Dad
• School
• God
• Friends
• Football Team
• Hair
• Cousins
• Grandmas and Grandpas
• Brothers
• Sister
• Teachers
• Coaches
• House
• Grandma's House
• Church
• Myself
• Bedroom
• Posters
• Dog
• House in Kentucky
• Clothes
• Watching the Reds, Colts and Pacer Games...especially when I actually get to go to the games with my grandmas, grandpas, dad and mom.

Madilyn B.

I like my...

• House
• Dogs
• Brother
• Mom
• Dad
• Pool
• Backyard
• Rabbit
• Bedroom...that I don't have to share with anyone
• Dreams
• Friends
• Grandmas
• Grandpas
• I like how I get to go to Colts, Pacers and Bear Games
• Cousins
• Aunts
• I like how I am the youngest in the family...so I'm spoiled!
• Teachers
• Cell phone
• Laptop
• iPod
• iPod Touch
• Locker
• Myself
• Upstairs
• Outdoor Kitchen
• Shoes
• Mom's car
• Basement
• Piano
• Seasons
• Kitchen
• Spa Days
• How I live ten seconds away from Ashley...she takes me places...she is like my sister.
• I like how my family has money to buy me anything
  

Dylan L.

I like my...

• Family
• Dog
• Pool
• Friends
• Water
• House
• Dad's House (Where I live.)
• Other Family
• Stuff at both Homes
• Awesome Hair
• Teachers
• Myself
• Summer
• Winter
• Laptop
• Cell Phone

Payton V.

I Like My...

• Home
• Family
• School
• Friends
• Dog
• Cousins
• Religion Teacher:)
• Sister and Brother
• Bedroom
• Shoes
• Rosary
• Church
• Clothes
• iPod Touch
• Middle School Teachers
• Me
• Seasons
• Cheerleading and Volleyball
• Locker
• Family is wealthy
• God
• Laptop
• Hair
• Being Catholic

Nicole F.

I Like My...

• Brown Hair
• Family, Mom, Dad, Morgan, Jake and Me!
• Clothes
• House
• Friends
• Dog
• Cats
• World
• School
• All Catholics
• All animals
• Nature
• I like that my Dad is not suffering anymore and that he is peaceful...in heaven.
• Teachers
• Sr. Nicolette
• Fr. Stan
• All of the Nuns
• God
• Seasons

What's on your list? Share with us on the comment section if you want! We would love to hear from you.

What's Your Favorite Mystery of the Rosary? Part 1

Finally school is back in session. I have 121 terrific students this year in grades 4-8. I'm blessed to spend five days a week with these students. My first post of the school year comes to you from the 4th graders. They were asked to simply write two or three sentences about their favorite mystery of the Rosary. Here are some of their responses.

My favorite Mystery of the Rosary is The Assumption because that's when Mary goes up into heaven and joins the Kingdom of God! (Amanda P.)

My favorite Mystery of the Rosary is The Resurrection because it is when Jesus rose from the dead. Jesus stayed on the earth for 40 days with his disciples. Then he goes back to heaven to be with His Father. (Eric D.)

My favorite Mystery is The Birth of Jesus because Jesus is born! He is very important because he is the Son of God. (Andrew L.)

My favorite mysteries of the Rosary are The Birth of Jesus and The Crucifixion. On Christmas God sent His only son down to save us! God loves us so much that He would do that for us. The Crucifixion is when Jesus saw our sins and cried tears of blood and He was scourged and made fun of and had to carry His own cross up a very big hill. After three hours hanging there on the cross He died for us and opened the gates of heaven. (Katie B.)

My favorite mystery of the Rosary is The Resurrection because Jesus rose from the dead and He proved to everyone that He was the Son of God. (Jose T.)

My favorite mystery is The Birth of Jesus. Why? Our Lord is Born! It's amazing that our God was born in a stable by the Virgin Mary! (Sophia C.)

My favorite mystery of the Rosary is The Crowning with Thorns and The Nativity. The Crowning with Thorns is one of my favorite Mysteries. It may be sad, but Jesus was already scourged at the pillar and He still was willing to be crucified for our sins. I think that shows us how much He loves us. The Birth of Our Lord is also one of my favorite mysteries because our Savior, the Messiah, was born a little baby that would one day grow up to save us. You may be thinking, "Well the other mysteries are important." They are and of course I like them, too. But these two are my favorites. (Kinzley T.)

Stay tuned for many more favorite Mysteries. In the meantime...what's your favorite Mystery of the Rosary and why?

Fr. Matthias Neuman's Homily for the 22nd Sunday in Ordinary Time

Readings: Sir 3:17-29; Heb 12:18-24; Lk 14:7-14

Today’s gospel passage gives us two parables of Jesus about attendance at wedding feasts. At first glance they can seem almost contradictory. In the first parable he tells the wedding guests, "Take a lower place, so you may be invited to a higher place. Then you will receive the esteem of everyone." It seems like it’s almost a tip about successful glory mongering. But then in the parable to the host, he says, "Only invite those who are poor, crippled, lame and blind." There aren’t going to be many of those who are looking for great public esteem. It’s confusing to the average listener today.

We should be aware that the whole parable tradition of Jesus’ teaching is notoriously hard to interpret. That’s because there are so many levels of interpretation and re-interpretation that they go through. There’s what the parable meant in Jesus’ original teaching. That’s one level, and a very hard one to ascertain. Then there are the ways that the parables were remembered, assembled together and used in the early Church. That’s a second level. Finally, there’s the way the parable gets used in a particular gospel. That’s a third level. Trying to work your way through all that is daunting----even for a scripture scholar.

I got some help in trying to unravel this from a very unusual source. It’s a book entitled, A Rabbinic Commentary on the New Testament. The author, who is a Jewish scholar named Samuel Tobias Lachs, shows the parallels that exist between the Synoptic gospels of the New Testament and various Jewish Rabbinical writings. There is, in fact, a Rabbinic teaching which is very close to Jesus’ words. This is a teaching of Rabbi Simeon ben Azzai: "Stay two or three seats below where you feel you should sit and sit there until they say to you, ‘Come up.’ Do not begin by going to a higher place because they may say to you, ‘Go down.’" And this whole passage in Luke’s gospel Lachs entitles, "On Humility." The evangelist Luke may therefore be putting into Jesus’ words a teaching on humility for both wedding guests and the host of the wedding dinner. That interpretation seems to be supported by the first reading today from Sirach, which was all about humility in our relations with others.

This presents a modern problem. In our current English language usage "to be a humble person" almost takes on a derogatory meaning. In fact, most of the meanings of "humble" listed in a standard dictionary are primarily negative. In my Random House Dictionary of the English language the following meanings are given for the word, humble: a. Not arrogant; modest; b. Having a feeling of insignificance or inferiority; c. Low in rank; d.(Verb) To lower in condition; e. To destroy the independence of. Humility gets much the same treatment. It’s hard to encourage people today to a practice of humility with common understandings like that. And yet that’s what Jesus does and we should take it seriously ourselves. But we need to understand humility and "being humble" not in the sense of current English usage, but the way it’s intended in the Scriptures.

We have to rehabilitate a proper Christian sense of being humble and the virtue of humility. In the Old Testament "to be humble" is, first and foremost, to know one’s place before God. It is to recognize that all we are and all we have received comes from the hand of God. As we pray in the first Children’s Eucharistic Prayer: "We thank you for this good earth, for the people who live on it, and for our very lives which are your gift." (I think it’s my favorite Eucharistic Prayer.) To be humble is to acknowledge who one is before the Mystery of God. In that sense humility becomes an act of worship. If we keep that in mind, then we will know our place in regard to other people. If we go back to those parables of Jesus that we began with, the key to understanding them is about recognizing one’s proper place. And if we have it fully in mind that all we are we have received from God, then there’s no need to promote one’s self-importance. That’s the virtue of humility. Let’s seek to live it.

Fr. Matthias Neuman's Homily for the 21st Sunday in Ordinary Time

Readings: Is 66:18-21; Heb 12:5-13; Lk 13:22-30

The teaching in today’s second reading from the Letter to the Hebrews isn’t something we like to hear: "Do not disdain the discipline of the Lord....for whom the Lord loves, he disciplines." Those words can cause a few shudders: what exactly does God have in mind for me? But before we jump to conclusions, we should examine the passage and its teaching a bit more thoroughly.

We should begin with how we immediately understand the word, discipline. When I began seminary high school at St. Meinrad back in 1955, one of the priests held the office of "Disciplinarian." His job was to mete out punishments to all the students who broke the rules and got caught. Unfortunately I got to know him pretty well. So, in that context, discipline is about getting punished for not obeying the rules. Now there are a lot of other meanings for the word, discipline—a course of study (the discipline of biology), a regular way of doing things, a certain training (military discipline), or even a whip (to take the discipline). But I would wager that most of us first thought about punishment when we heard those words: "whom the Lord loves, he disciplines."

Yet the larger context of the passage (the whole of chapter 12) as well as the biblical commentaries suggest that punishment is not the main meaning of the word, discipline, in this passage. Rather, that meaning is "the challenge to persevere in faith." (Those whom the Lord loves, he challenges to persevere in faith.) Along the many years of our life there may be some punishments, but the greater emphasis is on persevering in faith. Consider these other passages in the twelfth chapter of the Letter to the Hebrews: "let us run with perseverance the race that is set before us," "therefore lift your drooping hands and strengthen your weak knees." They all speak to the notion of persevering in faith.

However, that in itself presents huge challenges for people of our modern culture. The whole idea of gaining something by persevering hard work and denying yourself along the way dismays many people today. After all, the whole message and milieu of modern advertising is: "Get it now!" "Get it faster than ever before." Whether it’s the latest iPhone, the fastest computer, the newest car, the current fashion...the message is always, "Get it now!" I could see this problem arising thirty years ago in the seminary. Already back then many students couldn’t understand why they had to rewrite a paper or do more research on a topic. They had no concept of a "work in progress," of learning things through patient discipline and application. I think that anyone who teaches today should really seek to teach students the vision and practice of persevering discipline. Because they probably won’t get it anywhere else.

If you are trying to teach someone to follow a discipline, it helps a lot if you are doing it yourself. We can then be a little more straightforward and honest about how much hard work it takes. Any discipline takes hard work. Whether it’s keeping to that regular schedule of Lectio Divina, of that diet you’ve been trying to follow (Oh, that looks so good), or following that plan of regular exercise—any discipline requires effort, self-denial, patient perseverance and will power. All these things the Letter to the Hebrews is urging us to follow. Let’s respond to the challenge.

Fr. Matthias Neuman's Homily for Assumption

Assumption of Mary - Aug. 15, 2010

Readings: Rev. 11:19–12:6; 1 Cor 15:20-27; Lk 1:29-56

In the Jewish culture of Jesus’ day, there existed a type of literature called "midrash." This is a very important kind of writing. Midrash was a commentary or narrative that "filled in" the gaps that existed in the regular Scripture stories. There were many gaps in these sacred stories that people wondered about and they wanted to know about them. For example, what was going through Abraham’s mind when he was taking his son, Isaac, up the mountain to sacrifice him? What were the reactions of Adam and Eve to being expelled from the Garden of Eden? What was going through Moses’ mind when he was parting the Red Sea? The midrash writer tried to imagine those situations and write about them in a more detailed way. For example, someone asked a teacher why God appeared to Moses in a thornbush and not a more noble plant like a cedar of Lebanon? Rabbi Joshua ben Karhah answered: "To teach you that there is no space free of the Divine Presence, not even a thornbush." (Midrash Reader, p. 36)

It’s important for us to know that early Christian literature had many similar writings, although a lot of Christians today are not familiar with them. Early Christians too wanted to "fill in the gaps" in many of the Gospel stories. There were a lot of Midrashim written about Mary, the mother of Jesus: what was the conception and birth of Jesus like? How did she feel seeing the passion and death of Jesus? Did Jesus share any special knowledge with her? One early Christian document, the Gospel of Bartholomew, tries to fill in the relationship between Mary and the Apostles after the Resurrection: "Now the Apostles were together with Mary, and Mary said, ‘Let us stand up and pray.’ And the Apostles all stood behind Mary. She said to Peter, ‘Peter, chief of the Apostles, the greatest pillar, do you stand behind me? Did not our Lord say, The head of the man is Christ, but the head of the woman is man? Therefore stand in front of me to pray. But they all said to her: ‘In you the Lord set his tabernacle and was pleased to be contained within you. Therefore you now have more right than we to lead in prayer.’" (The Other Bible, p. 353) It’s important to know that, even though a writing like this was not accepted into the New Testament list, it was still frequently read by Christians and played a part in shaping their spirituality. We can see that already in the second century Christians were according a high place to Mary in their spirituality.

The Gospel of Bartholomew is a work of religious imagination of 1800 years ago, but in a real way we still continue that same process of "filling in the gaps." However, our world is very different from the 2nd or 3rd century Roman Empire. We ask different questions and are not as attracted as they were to super-physical wonders and powers (visions and fire from the mouth). We are attracted much more to Mary’s human virtues in her struggle along life’s way, virtues and a struggle that we can follow and try to imitate. There’s a lot of good spiritual writing about Mary that’s a kind of modern midrash. I remember that I was first impressed by this in a book by Max Thurian entitled, Mary, Mother of the Lord. (Max Thurian was a co-founder with Roger Schutz of the ecumenical monastery of Taize.) In this book Thurian described Mary as the epitome of the Jewish spirituality of her time—devoted to prayer and assiduous to all the requirements of the faith. Reading that was the first time Mary really came alive to me as a human person whom I could aspire to imitate. I remember a lovely chapter he had, entitled "Daughter of Zion."

Many other authors today have accented similar aspects about her: her spiritual courage in facing the unknown or her perseverance in faith through the passion and death of Jesus or her depth of love in taking John and the other Apostles as her own. Indeed, the Church has proclaimed Mary as our Mother and Model; we are to learn from her. That’s what we celebrate this day.

Fr. Matthias Neuman's Homily for the 19th Sunday in Ordinary Time

Readings: Wis 18:6-9; Heb 11:1-2, 8-19; Lk 12:32-40

The second reading this morning from the Letter to the Hebrews contains one of the most famous descriptions of faith in the entire New Testament: "Faith is the realization of what is hoped for and evidence of things not seen." This definition contains three aspects: what is hoped for, but still unseen, with only partial evidence for support. What is hoped for here is a future life with God in heaven. That’s made clear later on in the Hebrews reading. It’s also what we pray for so often in the liturgy, especially in the closing prayers of the Eucharist. Last Sunday we prayed: "Protect us with your love and prepare us for eternal redemption." The Sunday before that was: "May this gift bring us closer to our eternal salvation." We will hear the same theme in today’s closing prayer. Christian faith is ultimately hope for a future life with God.

That was very clear to all of us who can remember the pre-Vatican II Catholic Church. In those days all of life on this earth was simply a testing period, a preparation and a challenge to get to heaven. For good Catholics the challenge was always to avoid the snares of sin and the wiles of the devil, which were lurking everywhere. The effort to avoid those dangers required constant vigilance and penitence. I remember those boyhood days at St. Mary’s grade school so very well. While I enjoyed my childhood very much, growing up Catholic in the 1950s was far, far different than it is today.

Because everything drastically changed with Vatican II. Now, let’s be clear, the Council never denied that faith is hoping for a future life with God. It affirmed it strongly They simply said: that’s not the whole picture of what Christian faith includes. Christian faith encompasses other major areas as well as getting to heaven. Christian faith is also about building a just and peaceful society and world. That point was made powerfully in the Constitution on the Church in the Modern World. There Christian faith is seen as a commitment to build up a just world and bring it to fulfillment. (G&S # 93) In the forty-five years since that document many Catholics have heard and responded strongly to that message. Another major aspect of Christian faith that the Council also accented was appreciating and enjoying the beauty and goodness of God’s creation. A full Catholic Christian faith includes a true savoring of the good things that God has given to us. These three elements are all essential parts of what a full Christian faith should encompass.

That’s all beautifully said on paper, but a lot more difficult to live out in practice. I suspect that a lot of the confusion and turmoil in the Catholic Church in the years following Vatican II can be attributed to the challenges of trying to put these three factors together. There were many Catholics who couldn’t understand the Church getting involved in social justice and peace issues. They got very angry when they saw priests and sisters marching in the streets for civil rights or marching to protest the Vietnam war. Other Catholics, thoroughly imbued with the pre-Vatican II Catholic penitential ethos, found it very hard to savor or enjoy anything in God’s creation. They had been trained for so long to be suspicious of any pleasure. And, at the other end of the spectrum, some of those Catholics who did take up social justice issues got into them so deeply they seemed to forget the faith as a hoping for a future life with God. All this has made for a volatile half century since the close of the Council. That turmoil continues today and shows no signs of abating.

In a real way Catholics are still struggling with the challenge of putting together those three dimensions of faith. This Eucharist provides a good starting point for each of us to ask ourselves concretely: how alive is my hope for a future life with God? What do I do to contribute to building a more peaceful and just world? Where do I savor and enjoy the beauty and goodness of God’s creation? In other words, how healthy is my faith?

Jesus' August Message

Each month, Anne, a lay apostle, receives a message from Jesus. This is the message for August. To read more about the locutions Anne receives from Jesus and His Blessed Mother click on this link: Direction For Our Times.

Be at peace in your work, dear apostles. Neither hurry, nor delay. Do not pause in your service to heaven, wherever that service has taken you. We move at a steady pace if we are together. If you are working without Me, you may find yourself either hurrying or delaying. I do not hurry and I do not delay. Test yourself today. Determine your pace. If it is steady and you are calm, all is well. If your pace is hurried, and you are not calm, perhaps you have forgotten that it is My work you are doing, and not your own. If you have stopped working for heaven, because you are sad, frustrated or discouraged, then that is a sign that you need Me to renew you and restore your confidence in our togetherness. I speak to you of abandonment and I ask you to regard the outcome of your service as irrelevant in that you are not in control of the fruits of your day. Most days, you will not see the fruits. Most days, you will not be able to understand the fruits. This is because My beloved friends have a limited understanding of heaven’s power and heaven’s patience. If heaven has a goal to accomplish, heaven begins preparing early. Much of your service, My dear apostles, will be that of sowing seeds for future conversions. Dearest apostles, so close to Me, can you accept this? Will you trust Me? Many people contribute to the construction of a building on earth. Think of all that happens before the building is erected. All of the materials must be created and fashioned and then assembled and there must be a plan. The people producing the materials may never see the building that is erected through their cooperation. It is this way with the Kingdom of God. There are many hands at work in this world assembling materials for the construction of the edifice that the Father has willed for His Church on earth at this time. You are my diligent workers who cheerfully stand forward to serve the King. I thank you, dear friends. I urge you to trust, to patience and to lively participation in this plan, wherever I have placed you. Rejoice! Show others the happiness that comes with knowing you are loved and protected.

Fr. Matthias Neuman's Homily for the 18th Sunday in Ordinary Time

Readings: Ecc 1:2; 2:21-23; Col 3:1-5,9-11; Lk 12:13-21

I’d like to reflect some reflections this morning on one of the most well-known books of the Bible as well as one of the least-known books of the Bible. Oddly they are the very same book—the one we heard in today’s first reading from the book of Ecclesiastes. Biblical scholars prefer to use its Hebrew name (Koheleth). It’s well-known mainly because of two passages: the one we just heard, "Vanity of vanities, all is vanity," and the opening of chapter three, "For everything there is a season, and a time for every purpose under heaven." Other than those two very well-known passages, the great majority of Christian believers probably know very little about the book. It almost never occurs in the Lectionary readings. Other than this Sunday it only appears every other year on a couple of weekdays in September. Among Scripture scholars it is the subject of many, many questions—the biggest one being, "How in the world did this book ever make it into the Bible?" I’ll explain the reasons for that question a little later. Scholars are divided on how many authors might have contributed to the work; estimates vary from one to four. There are also many questions about when it was written.

To those who read the book, Koheleth is the great debunker of almost everything in the biblical tradition. All life, including all religion, is vanity; it’s like a puff of air that comes and goes. Koheleth has been called the great skeptic of the bible. He never denies the sovereignty or plan of God for the world; he simply doubts the ability of the human mind to grasp God’s intentions clearly and accurately. The more anyone proclaims, "I have it," the more Koheleth says, "it’s all vanity." He protests the attempts of believers to buttress their faith with dogma, authority, tradition or revelation. Koheleth remains skeptical and even a bit cynical about all such efforts.

Many believers who read the whole book for the first time are shocked at some of Koheleth’s attitudes and judgments. They find passages about the futility of seeking too much religious knowledge (5:1-6). He says it’s absurd to push oneself to a great deal of religious asceticism. In fact, he even sees value in not taking religion too seriously and he definitely sees value in not praying too much. He also says that people shouldn’t try to save the world from all the cruelty and injustice in it. (3:16-21) Koheleth remains very suspicious of any authority; religious leaders and kings don’t always say what they mean. To him most bureaucracies, including religious ones, are corrupt and primarily concerned with perpetuating themselves.(5:8-9) All in all it’s better to have nothing to do with them.

In the midst of all this ferment against most things the bible usually stands for, Koheleth does offer some positive advice, although it’s limited in scope. He advises people to maintain a fundamental reverence for God, but a reverence that keeps a respectful agnosticism about the world God created and God’s plans for it. No one can really explain why so much religious ideology and corruption abound in the world. The best thing is to stay away from it as best one can and appreciate the small, good things we receive from God’s bounty. Do everything in moderation! Keep your religious practices simple, clean, honest and short! He writes: "Avoid extremes. If you have a simple reverence for God, you will be successful." (7:18)

So, how did this book ever make it in the bible? It goes so much against the mainstream. The consistent message of the Prophets is that God loves justice and hates iniquity. Koheleth says: we can’t know what God’s justice is. The whole overview of both Old Testament and New Testament builds on the Plan of God for Israel and the Church through the scope of Creation, Redemption and ultimate Fulfillment. Koheleth says: we can’t know what that is. So, why is it in the Bible? Well...there are those days in our lives when each one of us entertains serious doubts about our faith in God’s Plan. Maybe they put the book of Koheleth in the Bible so we will have something to read on those days.