Ready for Healthier?

This is that time of year for us, especially us Catholics, to ask ourselves if we are ready to get healthier.

And as I set those words down, I can almost hear her voice.

It was a long time ago, a very long time ago.

She was one of the members of that season's RCIA group.  And for those not familiar with those letters - RCIA -  Try Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults. It is a process whereby adults, perhaps sensing some movement of God in their lives, enter into a discernment process. Is God calling them? Asking something of them? Leading them somewhere they as yet, perhaps, have not fully been. And dare they respond to such a call. What may it cost? What are its risks? What might happen to their lives from that moment on?

RCIA involves some study, more reflection and much, much more prayer. It can be a difficult and challenging life movement.

Anyhow, so many years ago, I was leading one of the study sessions for the RCIA group and Lent was approaching and so I decided to spend some time presenting some background and history behind the development of the season we now call Lent. As I came into more contemporary times, I talked about some of the communal Lenten practices:  fasting (which meant no food, nothing, nada between meals and two small daily meals (sufficient to maintain strength but both, together, not having as much food as the one, allowed main meal.) Food consumption was reduced greatly during those Forty Days. And then there was abstaining from all meats and meat by-products. 

Fridays (Lent and all year long) were days of total abstaining together with a number of additional days throughout the year, which meant on those designated days there would be no meat or those meat by-products. But back in the day, when Monday through Saturday every week in Lent were days of fasting, that also meant at least partial abstaining. Meat only at the main meal and never in between all week  long.

As I described these Lenten dietary regulations, one voice spoke up. The RCIA lady, a professional nurse. And she asked the question. "Why did you quit all of that?" she asked. "It sounds very healthy to me!"

And, of course, she was right.

Too many of us eat too much and we definitely eat too much meat. 

And that got me thinking. 

And more than thinking. It got me acting.

For a good number of years, every Lent, I tried  to get "healthier." Monday through Saturday for me became meatless, totally meatless. I allowed myself some bacon at breakfast on the Sundays and also some of that meat and meat by-product stuff through the day, but those Lenten weekdays became meatless.

It was my Lenten "body cleanse."

In more recent years I will confess to putting that practice aside.

However, as this year's Lent approached, I began to hear that voice again, yes, even after all of these years. "Why did you quit?" Only this year I am hearing it with a new and richer meaning.

If you haven't been paying attention, lately studies have been demonstrating how our prodigal consumption of meats is negatively impacting our environment. What it takes to raise, feed and maintain those animals that are slaughtered tor our dinner tables is harming the health of Mother Earth and Sister Air and Brother Water.

There is much now being said and written about Catholics going back to at very least forgoing meat again on all Fridays throughout the year. Something called meatless Mondays is also beginning to get some attention. And the meatless call is going out even beyond Catholic boundaries.

(If you want a quick glimpse of what studies are showing, check this article out: America Magazine: Catholics and Meat.)

And it is, as that very wise RCIA nurse declared, healthier!

Not just for us but for the world in which we live.

Reducing the amount of meat we consume is proving to be healthier for us and for our environment.

So, for Lent again this year, I will be passing on the meat and meat by-products.

I invite you to consider joining me. Maybe you are not yet ready for the Monday through Saturday regime but how about adding one or two additional days to the already set Fridays together with Ash Wednesday? And going a step further, how about considering a more permanent lifestyle change and reducing your consumption of meat even outside of Lent?

It just may make you healthier.

And it will make our beautiful but suffering world healthier.

Oh! And if this may be your concern - go ahead. Enjoy that corned beef on St Patrick's Day!

February - - - and that reminds us we have WHAT???

It being February, I guess that caused me to actually learn something. Or perhaps it really was not learning anything new so much s it was simply putting two and two together and, somehow, for the first time discovering "four!"

Long before this February arrived, I already knew that back in the late third century the Catholic Church hd a Pope Victor I.

I also knew that, like so much of that part of our ancient history, little is known about this pope or his dealings. Items, however,  known include his attempt to pull varying factions together into agreeing on a common day, specifically a Sunday, for observing Easter. He did not do too well in his time on that particular issue. However, there is another in which he rather overwhelmingly succeeded.

He is the one who quite literally gave the Roman Church Latin.

Prior to him, the common language of the Church was also the common language of the Roman Empire and that was Greek. It was most used although, when it came to the language of liturgy, a number of other languages were also in play. Linguistic uniformity was not the norm, not even in play.

Pope Victor I brought Latin into ecclesiastical use in Rome.

I knew about Victor (sort of) and I knew about the introduction of the use of Latin (sort of.)

But this February I did some exploring and some research with a whole different perspective in mind.

See, February is Black History Month and that extends a call for us all to come to explore a part of human history that has too often been overlooked or even ignored. Maybe some consider that segment of our history too be a bit too painful to face. However, if we are to be truly human, we need to know better all of our history.

And that quest led me to put a two and two together and discover a hidden "four" in our history.

You see - Pope Victor I was from Africa! He is considered the first Black Catholic Pope! And this is the guy who introduced us to using Latin!

Now that is a piece of Black Catholic History that probably opens many an eye!

And that also raises the question: How much Black Catholic History do we really know?

Of course, historians will quickly point out in this matter that our more contemporary concepts of race were not the same as those held in earlier centuries. True. However, Victor 1 is listed as our first Black Pope.

Consider this - in our Religious Education classes, how much awareness is given to our young about that part of our history and culture? 

Do we take time with the story contained in Acts of the Apostles (Acts :26 - 40) about the interaction between the Deacon Phillip and the Ethiopian, a tale reminding us that before the Good News headed north into Europe, it was taking root in the south, in Africa and Ethiopians, even back then were definitely not Western Europeans.

Consider our litany of saints - include those African Greats such as Augustine and his mother, Monica, and Perpetua and Felicity and - well, perhaps it is time for some exploration and a little Googling to break open the richness of our not just Black but universal history.

And in that search and discovery, we dare not ignore our own African/Americans who even now are on the way to sainthood. The Church in the United States has been truly blessed. Do we even know how richly? or by whom? Do we know any of their names? Their stories?

If I mentioned John Augustus Tolton, would that register with you?

How about Mary Elizabeth Lange? or Thea Bowman?

And if you know nothing of Thea Bowman, you are really missing out! She is a true gem in our history - her music! her speeches!

Perhaps it is long overdue to start helping ourselves and our young to become more aware of just how Catholic we truly are and our enriched we can be because of it.

Our religious classes need to be truly "catholic."

Our images in our places of gathering and worship need to far better reflect our catholicity.

Bulletin art and calendar art needs to proclaim - We are truly a Catholic Church!

It is February.

The weather is still not all that great. Winter has still locked her grip.

So, why not use some of this time to do some personal, enriching exploration.

Google things like "Black" and "Catholic" and see if you don't discover an old, reliable two and two that suddenly make four!

And this is in tribute to and memory of a dear friend, Oliver Wilford - RIP -d.2022

Happy, er . . . or Merry, er . . . or Seasons . . .

How do we say it?

How should we say it?

The December Dilemma is now upon us in full force.

Will someone be offended by my greeting?

Should I care?

Should I try to be "politically correct" or throw caution to the wind?

Happy Holidays!

Or should it be Season's Greetings?

And having set those two options out there, I can almost hear the outcry, somewhere in the distance but, oh, so very real.

It's Merry Christmas!

That's what it is!

Christmas!

And don't anyone dare to give the shortened - Xmas - version!

Christmas!

And that is that!

We are celebrating the birth of the Lord, Jesus Christ, and that is that! So, Merry Christmas!

And please note, I use the word "birth" rather than birthday because, truth be told - and close your ears and, perhaps, even your mind for this one - we really do not know for fact the exact day of the actual birth of Jesus! There are no records to be had, no certificates of birth, nothing of the sort. The Gospels are silent when it comes to giving us even a hint of when this event took place. There is no mention of snow or cold or hint of winter or blossoms of spring or even of a torrid summer day. The actual birthday of Jesus could well have been in July!

 We who believe, we people of faith, are called to celebrate the coming of Jesus into our history, Emmanuel, God with us. That is the critical fact not an actual day of birth.

And in our earliest years, our ancestors in faith did not celebrate anything like  this at all. They started with a clean slate, an empty calendar. For many years there was no "Christmas" or even Church calendar!

Oh, there was, indeed, a celebration late December. It was a grand and glorious celebration, a feast for which folks really did look forward.

As the days grew shorter and the dark nights longer, people without the modern luxury of electricity, found themselves ever more limited in terms of work, travel, activities of most any sort. The darkness kind of locked them in. The darkness was inhibiting, restricting, even fearful.

And so they prayed as they knew how and they begged and pleaded with the gods as they knew back then. And they knew one great, powerful god who had the power to dispel the darkness.

The Invincible Sun God!

To this god they would feast with song and dance and festivities so powerful as to compel this god to return yet again and drive out this all-encompassing darkness. It was a celebration designed to show that Sun God just how fun it could be in our midst.

And it worked!

Days began to grow longer; times of sunlight began to increase. That Sun God heard the prayers, the invitation of the people and saw the joyfulness with which they would great him. And the celebration brought about results.

And, honestly, the whole thing was a lot of fun, So much so, in fact, that as the Roman World became increasingly Christian, there were some things that the newly minted believers were hesitant to give up.

Like that December Party!

And so we "baptized" it!

We made it to be a celebration of the coming of the true Light into this all too dark world. Early on I suspect many elements of that more ancient feast were folded into this observance but as the centuries passed, this observance became more and more a religious event centering solely around the coming of the Light of the World into our darkness.

But eventually a fellow named Clement Clarke Moore discovered untapped potential in this celebration and his discovery provided encouragement for the likes of Hallmark and then Sears and Neumann Marcus and a whole lot of others who jumped on the gifting, greeting bandwagon.

And then came the big, really big discovery.

We are not all Western Europeans!

We are a richly diverse people with a wondrous array of celebrations. We have things like Hanukkah which is an even more ancient celebration of light and Kwanzaa, a more modern celebration of basic values and a multitude of folk out there who adhere to none of the above traditions but who still feel the need to celebrate something in the midst of so much darkness.

And so we have what we have today - a symphony of feasts!

But if you look at all of them, in one way or other they all speak of a very basic human longing, a deep and often unrecognized hunger.  

Those decorations speak of a longing for light in the midst of so much darkness.

Those gifts speak of a longing for the greatest of gifts - the Gift that can set us truly free.

Those gatherings and dinners and parties and phone calls and greeting cards speak of a longing to be connected, community rather than disconnected and disjointed.

So many in their celebrating of so much in this time of the year do not even realize the hunger which they express in their revelry.

Those of us who know, who believe, who proclaim "Merry Christmas!" have found what so very many seek even without admitting their emptiness.

And we do not help them by beating them over the head with, "It's Christmas, dummy!"

To whatever manner in which they choose to greet us, we can respond gently, with courtesy,  "Merry Christmas to you too."

And when we hear them say, "Happy Holidays," we might see that as an invitation to speak a silent prayer for them that they find what they do not even admit they seek.

And when we hear them say, "Seasons Greetings," again that invitation.

A whole lot of people are seeking and searching because there is truly a whole lot of darkness these days, a whole lot of darkness.

Prayerfully, respectfully, charitable we can respond to them in a way that invites them to know that we have found the very Gift that they are seeking.

Welcome their "Happy Holidays!" or "Seasons Greetings!"

Then bless them back with "Merry Christmas!" 

And a silent prayer!

“Getting vaccinated is a simple yet profound way to care for one another, especially the most vulnerable,”  - Pope Francis 

The Lost Election

I am suspecting that the reason why I have lost every recent papal election may well have to do with the days that are upon us now.

And just in case you have not noticed, as of yet I have not won a papal election. While I might still claim to being "too young," that excuse is loosing its grip.

Time to face the real reason.

I suspect that there are some cardinals out there who know!

They have discovered what one of my first official acts just might be.

And they are afraid of the repercussions and as a result, I have continued to get overlooked in the balloting for pope!

So, I just might as well go public with what I would have done had I actually gotten elected. (Oh, and BTW, someday some future office holder just may do what I am suggesting.)

It has to do with our calendar.

It needs a change! A major one!

Soon now in churches all across the globe, Catholic and other Christian denominations, the People of God will once again have to put up with presiders cheerfully announcing, "Happy New Year!"

And then, as happens year in and year out, they will explain that the calendar does still have another month to the present year. However, we are talking Church Year and the new Church year begins on the First Sunday of Advent.

And so, "Happy New Year!"

As Pope I would declare that our Church Year will no longer begin on the First Sunday of Advent. Instead, let's pick a far more suitable and meaningful time.

How about Ash Wednesday?

Would it not make more sense spiritually to begin a New Year with a season of repentance and renewal, a dedicated time for strengthening our efforts to do better and be better?

But . . . but . . .  but! I can hear it now.

But  The Story begins with Advent!

We cannot do what you suggest. It would destroy The Story!

And, true! The Story does begin with Advent. If we are about the telling and retelling of The Story, well then, Advent takes us back in our memory to those days and years and even centuries of waiting. And then Christmas comes and the waiting is fulfilled and the Promise is kept and then the rest of  The Story unfolds - Magi and Baptism and teachings and healings and Jerusalem and Calvary and so on and so on.

Yes, the year should begin with Advent if we are all and only about a telling and retelling of The Story.

If the whole purpose of our seasons and our feasts is merely a sort of nostalgic remembering of events from some distant yesterday, then the starting point, logically, would be Advent.

But I say and I emphasize that little word - IF.

It is, most certainly, important that we remember our past. However, when it comes to religious remembering, to the remembering that we seek to embodying our feasts and seasons, that remembering must serve a purpose far greater than the telling and retelling of stories from our past. Our remembering is and should be for the sake of forming our present and guiding us into our future.

The Hebrews of old remembered each Passover the events of their past, the memories of the Exodus Events not just for the sake of telling historic tales but for the sake of opening themselves here and now to the working of God right now in their present moments and also to dispose themselves to a longing for the day when God's Will would reach fulfillment. "Next year, in Jerusalem."

Advent, while it can serve to properly dispose us to a coming feast, should be far more important.

It should serve to heighten our awareness of the fact that the Lord who once came to dwell among us, still is present to us here and now. Advent should  awaken anew our sense of care of all who enable and invite us to love and serve Him in very real, concrete, here and now ways - in our service to the poor, the hungry, the imprisoned, the stranger, the sick, the refugee, the marginalized and so on. "Whatsoever you do for the least of my brethren, that you do unto me!"

Add to that Advent should stir up within us the awareness that we are moving day by day, hour by hour toward that day when we will see Him face to face. He will come again and we will see His face and hear His voice!

It certainly seems to me that having Advent at the closing of our Church Year would serve to focus ur attention more sharply on a Day yet to come and on the day that is right here under our eyes.

However, it can certainly be easier and more comfy to focus on a Once-upon-a-time story from some long ago yesterday, especially one that involves a little Baby. Living in the past can be way more comforting than facing the present and embracing that uncatchable tomorrow.

But we should not be about comfort. We, followers of the Gospel, should be about being challenged to live the Gospel right now.

And that can be painful.

Singing "Silent Night" is way easier than living "Wake, Awake, the Night is Dying!"

But think about it.

Advent focuses us on how things will end. Christmas focuses us on what is right here before us, the opportunities here and now.

And then we start anew with ashes marking our foreheads and calling us to get busy doing better.

Nice!

But ain't gonna happen.

I can't get elected!

And I am getting too old!

“Getting vaccinated is a simple yet profound way to care for one another, especially the most vulnerable,”  - Pope Francis 

The End of the World

And here it comes!

The Thirty-Third Sunday in Ordinary  Time

AKA a Sunday after Pentecost in certain Christian Traditions

But, however you may call it, here comes the final "Green Sunday" of the current liturgical year.

And this, in almost every mainstream Christian tradition is the weekend when we hear those wondrous words. You know the ones. They are all about such neat happenings like stars falling from the sky and sun and moon no longer giving their light and famines and earthquakes and all sorts of other exciting happenings.

And when these words are finished being set out before us, this year from the Gospel of Mark next year we will get to enjoy Luke and last year we embraced Matthew's version, well, when these words are set out before us, we will conclude with the declaration, ""The Gospel of the Lord."

And we will respond with our "Thanks be to God!"

Gospel, by the way, means Good News!

So, stars falling, sun dimming, earthquakes rumbling and famines famishing - all Good News!

Well, chances are that in many (most) churches throughout the United States, we will simply give that response and close our books and maybe even our minds.

We certainly do not have to worry about stuff like that, do we?

After all, that is about the End of the World and who knows when that will come and it hasn't come in all these years, so why worry now? Just listen, and then respond with our words of gratitude.

Unless . . . 

What if these words of Jesus are echoing often repeated biblical words - words about not just a time when all will end but times when the world as we know it will end?

What if Jesus, like prophets of old, was telling us that we should expect that there will be times when the world as we know it will come to an end? It would in fact seem to be truly Good News if we were being told in advance that such times of endings will come and they will have the potential for being times of blessing. They will challenge us and invite us to reexamine what has been and they will give us the opportunity to make new and different and better.

What if these words were telling us to expect  a time such as we have been having since March, 2020,  a time that, while seeming to ease presently, has actually brought about an ending of the world as we once knew it?

Consider all that we have been living through in recent months. We have literally seen the world shut down. The Mighty United States was brought low, not just in that far away place of Afghanistan but right here in our own land with businesses shut, education virtual and emergency rooms overcrowded and thousands of lives ended.

Together with that we have been experiencing our view of history and of all humankind questioned and challenged by the resurfacing of an awareness of the -isms that haunt us and even still shape so many of us and our customs and institutions. We have been brought face to face with the need for some radical change.

To all of this we have seen flood-causing rains tearing through the streets of our cities and the basements of our homes, ravaging flames eradicating whole neighborhoods. Choose to ignore or choose to face, nature itself is raging against us.

The litany goes on.

And truly these are days when the sun and moon have been darkened and the stars have been falling from the sky.

But when Jesus and the prophets before Him spoke of those days of world-ending events, they spoke to a people of faith, a people who believed in God who truly is ever in command. Jesus spoke to a people who knew from experience the wonder and depth of God's love for them, a love that would not let go of them but rather a love that would guide them through those dark, ending times into a new and better time.

To fully embrace these words and to fully enter into this most turbulent and cathartic time of our today, we need to be that people of faith, that people who can listen to the Voice of the Lord, read the signs of this time and embrace the call to do better, to be better.

Of course it is always possible to ignore the possibility of God at work. It is possible to refuse any Divine invitation. We can choose to simply go back to the "good old days."

Or we can choose to grow and in that growing to commit ourselves to building better and being better.

After all, Jesus has called us to be citizens, not of any kingdom of this world but rather of the Kingdom of God.

And we are not there yet!

“Getting vaccinated is a simple yet profound way to care for one another, especially the most vulnerable,”  - Pope Francis 

An Hour!

Twenty- one dollars!

That is not per month,

or per week

or even per day.

That is twenty-one dollars per hour!

That is what I heard the other day while driving to or from somewhere or other. The car radio was on and the current news was being broadcast and that is when I heard it. 

Some major  bank was offering twenty-one dollars an hour as the entry level wage. They were announcing that, at least for their employees, twenty-one dollars an hour would be considered the minimum wage!

Of course, with our current situation and so many hesitant for one reason or other, mostly fear of returning to on site workplaces in light of the still evident pandemic and others hesitant because of the difficulty of providing proper childcare and such, prospective employers are offering greater and greater incentives to recruit workers.

I have seen oh so many "Help Wanted" signs.

I have seen signs offering a starting salary of fifteen dollars an hour, eighteen dollars and hour and, of course, those offering to cover young workers' college tuition costs.

And now - twenty-one dollars an hour!

That took me back and perhaps I can even take you back a bit as I share my journey.

I started working as a delvery carrier for the Detroit Free Press. That was back in the early 1950's and my route, considered a rather large one for the time, involved delivering the evening edition of the newspaper. In addition to delivering the papers, weekly it fell to me to also collect from the customers. My pay for this work consisted of a percentage of what I collected plus any tips given.

A good week might bring me around $5.00, sometimes even a it better. That was for the week not the hour!

In high school I managed to get a part time and then summer job in a drug store. I was the stock boy and my duties mostly consisted of unloading deliveries, replenishing merchandise on shelves an occasionally, when busy, waiting on customers. That drug store was located a block from a local "stadium" and Friday evenings were especially tension-filled. The store had an ice cream counter and if a stadium game ended before closing time, fans flocked to the counter for a treat. That meant filling in as soda jerk to a mob of frenzied fans, working late but not for overtime.

Pay for that job, as I recall, was a straight twenty dollars.

Per week - not per hour.

Had a couple of other summer jobs - one year processing traffic tickets for the City of Detroit and another processing property tax payments. 

A dollar something per hour for that work, and a straight forty hours per week.

One summer I got a really good paying job!

I worked on the Wayne County Road Crew- tarring roads, painting weigh scales and  fun stuff like that while making the grand sum of $2.14 per hour!

That summer I was rich!

And I had a great tan!

There were also a couple of summers when I worked and lived on campus at Orchard Lake doing office clerical work. Didn't earn as much as that Road Commission job but there was that extra perk. I could "'sing" Masses early mornings.

In those days places like that had multiple altars and early mornings the priests on faculty would descend for their Masses. They were able to collect stipends for those Masses and the usual stipend was $3.00 for a Low Mass and $5.00 for a High Mass.

A High Mass meant a sung Mass and so the priest had to find someone to sing certain parts of the Mass. For that special service the singer received $1.00. And because altars were so nice and close to each other, it was possible to be present and singing for a couple of Masses almost simultaneously!

In an hour on a good day that could mean five/six dollars per hour! And that all before actually going to work.

When I was ordained, I arrived.

I now had a guaranteed, regular paycheck.

My starting salary was a whole seventy-five dollars.

Per month!

Ah! But there was a perks hidden here as well.

Those stipends for those daily Masses were ours. That meant an extra five dollars a day every day.

Add it all up!

And that was then.

This is now - twenty-one dollars an hour, fifteen dollars an hour, eighteen dollars an hour!

And here we are.

And you just might make the observation - Yes, but way back when, things were way less expensive than they are today. Just look at some prices - gas today is what? $3.29 a gallon? Back when - eighteen cents a gallon! Bread - back when twenty cents? Today - $3.00 and up a loaf! Back when a night's stay at the equivalent of a Motel Six was $18 but today, well, let's talk about pushing a hundred dollars and up just for a place to sleep for the night!

Yes, things cost more now, no question about it.

And we cost more - workers today expect more, request more, even demand more.

Is it that things cost more because we earn more or is it that we earn more because things cost more?

And which came first - chicken or egg?

Fact is that we probably did just fine back in the days when . . .

And we are doing just fine today as well.

The numbers may have changed but the basic human circumstances are rather the same today as they were back in the day.

We still can afford (even if we tend to complain about cost) and we still have a little to put away for that rainy day.

And very, very likely today, just like yesterday, we even have some extra to share with those who for whatever reason cannot possibly realize anywhere near twenty-one dollars an hour.

Of even a day.

Or sometimes even a week!

Times were good for so many of us back in the day . . . and times are good today.

“Getting vaccinated is a simple yet profound way to care for one another, especially the most vulnerable,” Pope Francis 

Words for Our Time . . . for All Time

Before I forget . . .  before I lose it . . .  which is all too easy to happen, I want to put these words down to be captured and remembered and, hopefully, treasured.

So, here it comes.

And the words inspiring this writing come from someone that you may admire, you may treasure or, conversely, you may despise, maybe even loathe.

So be it.

But heed these words.

Latch onto these words.

Even, please, treasure these words.

They are important, critically important.

They are words spoken by the Vice-President of the United States of American on this day, September 11, 2021, twenty years after that horrid and fateful day, that 9/11.

Kamala Harris spoke them today at the memorial service in Shanksville, Pennsylvania.

Please hear them with your ears, your eyes and most importantly, your heart.

This place, she declared, is sanctified by sacrifice.

Sanctified by sacrifice!

In the air above that field thirty-three, mostly strangers, who happened to be in the same plane at the same time, confronting the same terror at the same time, united, responded and sacrificed for the sake of others.

And now that field, that place, is sanctified by sacrifice.

And that is a truth that needs to resound loudly, so very, very loudly in our time, twenty years later.

Sanctified by sacrifice.

Is not that the lesson that that young Israelite caught to teach us all on that hill called Calvary some twenty centuries ago?

Sanctified by sacrifice.

That hill is now considered sanctified by the Sacrifice of Jesus Christ who gave His life so that we might truly live.

And those buildings that we call, sometimes, churches, sometimes synagogues or even temples, and sometimes mosques as well and all other such places, they are considered holy, sanctified by sacrifice.

And those places which we call "home"  are truly such when they are filled with the spirit of sacrifice - parents for their children, siblings one of each other - holy - sanctified by sacrifice.

And communities become special, yes, even holy, sanctified when the members are filled with that spirit that leads to thinking of one another, working with and for one another and sacrificing for one another.

Sanctified by sacrifice!

In this time when so many are bending to the temptation to think first and often only of themselves, when the rallying cry seems to be "freedom" at any cost, we need this reminder.

We are called first and foremost to holiness, to sanctity.

It is in this that our lives are truly fulfilled, made whole when we are becoming holy.

And, as that field in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, reminds us -

Sanctification comes through sacrifice.

Sanctify this land of ours by sacrifice.

And sanctify yourself by your willingness to sacrifice!

Meantime, 

Keep Praying

 . . . and Stay Safe!

Oh! And please  get your shot! It's the charitable thing to do.