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08 Nov 2015 - Thirty-second Sunday in Ordinary Time, Cycle B

“She, from her poverty, has contributed all she had.” Poor widows play leading roles in the vivid stories told in 2 Kings and the gospel, but the star of the show is faith. The trust in God of both Elijah and the widow he encountered turned a situation of deprivation and death into one of sustenance and life. In the gospel the poor widow showed her total devotion to God by giving “her whole livelihood.” She offers a model for the disciples who, like her, are called to imitate their Lord’s total reliance on the Father’s will and complete willingness to sacrifice everything for the salvation of all so that “jars of flour” and “jugs of oil” may remain full forever.

Trust Faith

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The inner word

04 Oct 2015 - Twenty-seventh Sunday in Ordinary Time, Cycle B

Why was Jesus angry with the disciples for trying to stop people from bringing children to him? For one, he liked children and wanted to give them his blessing. He also didn’t want his disciples to get in the way of a teachable moment about why it was important to have the trust of a child in order to accept the kingdom of God. What and whom do you trust? Do you trust God with the utter innocence and vulnerability of a child?

Trust

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The inner word

02 Aug 2015 - Eighteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Cycle B

The Israelites “grumbled” many times during their sojourn through the desert to the land God had promised them. In many cases God’s reaction was anger at the people’s failure to trust in God’s guidance, despite the circumstances. In this week’s reading, however, God’s ultimate response was an act of care: sending them the “flesh” and “bread” they desired. Complaints against God are not in themselves a sin; they figure in scripture on many occasions. It’s what they lead to that’s important. Doubt can lead to belief; even questioning shows you value in a relationship. Don’t be afraid to bring your uncertainties to God. You just might be opening a door to greater faith.

Doubt distrust uncertainty

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Exploring the word

12 Apr 2015 - Solemnity of the Second Sunday of Easter; Divine Mercy Sunday, Cycle B

What does your faith do for you? How does it motivate you? For too many religious people, faith is simply the word they use to describe why they go to church. Faith means they believe God exists—and that Existence has negative consequences for those who don’t obey the rules. Such belief also has positive consequences for those who toe the line: a golden ticket of forgiveness and a pass to heavenly rewards. But that understanding of faith is not what the Bible expresses nor what the early church testifies to in the Acts of the Apostles. Faith doesn’t actually require “believing” anything. It means trusting God, not giving a nod to divine reality. There was a gospel pop song decades ago about “putting your hand in the hand of the man from Galilee.” It may be a bit sugary for your tastes, but it got the message right. It’s vital that we allow God to take us in hand in much the same way a child will wholeheartedly accept the hand of a trusted adult and be led into any situation, no matter how new or frightening. That’s what faith is: not about what we think or don’t think, what we intellectually accept or deny. It’s about following the lead of Jesus and trusting that his path will take us to his Father. In the first generation of the church, it doesn’t sound like anyone was asked for a creedal statement before they were received into the community. Some signaled their confidence in God by relinquishing their confidence in worldly advantages. Now that’s trust: selling your property and handing over the sale price to the religious leaders! While this was never the mandatory price for Christian membership, doing it was certainly a sign that you were in this discipleship thing hook, line, and sinker. It mimicked the response of the first disciples who encountered Jesus, tossed their nets on the shore, and walked off to follow him for keeps. No one is asking us to do the same today. Nor would I advise anyone to sell their Subaru and surrender the market value to the parish secretary. But the story is still a benchmark: How far are we willing to take this trust in God that we profess? How much of what we possess, love, or invest ourselves in is off limits to our faith? For Thomas, trust was something he was willing to give directly to Jesus. But not to the witness of the church, perhaps because he knew its ragged humanity too well and by name. Most of us don’t judge Thomas because we understand his position. Can we trust one another on this journey of discipleship? Can we trust papacies and doctrines, centuries and saints, scriptures and processes that have taken this church across two millennia and counting?

Authors Alice Camille

Trust Faith

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Sign & sacrament

16 Nov 2014 - Thirty-third Sunday in Ordinary Time, Cycle A

Any gift from God is an occasion for our greatest praise. Christ, however, often reminds us that praise merely begins our acceptance of God’s grace. What follows is responsibility. The act of giving not only displays God’s love, but also God’s trust. Booker T. Washington touched upon the complex nature of this gift when he said, “Few things can help an individual more than to place responsibility on him, and to let him know that you trust him.” By taking responsibility for the gifts God has given us, we confirm both our faith in God and God’s faith in us. Look at the particular gifts you have been given and how you can use them to move the world toward God.

Trust gifts

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Exploring the word

02 Nov 2014 - Commemoration of All the Faithful Departed (All Souls’ Day), Cycle A

A feast like this is a day of great assurances. There’s nothing to fear. Not misfortune or failure, not suffering or loss, not death or oblivion. “All is calm,” as the hymn of another season reminds us. This blanket of calm envelopes our turbulent human reality for the same reason as it does in the hymn: Because into this troubling, dangerous, and treacherous world, the word of life has come. Jesus has made up his mind, as we hear today in John’s testimony. Jesus will not reject anyone who makes his or her way to him. That’s an astonishing pledge, in a world where we reject each other for any number of reasons routinely. You belong to the wrong religion. You don’t have the right papers. Your speech or complexion is different. You don’t vote the way I do. You don’t have the same abilities to compete in this culture. You didn’t go to the right schools. The way you live is against my rules, or God’s rules as I understand them. Jesus accepts everyone who moves in his direction. But don’t think it’s because he’s not as discriminating in standards or taste as you and I are! It’s a matter of perfect obedience to God. God so loves the world, enough to save it. God wills no one should be lost if they come by way of Jesus, the path of truth and life. Because Jesus is the wide-open way, all is calm. Peace reigns. Mercy flows. There’s nothing to fear along this boulevard of grace. All is calm. But we are not calm. We worry. We’re anxious. We bear pockets of little terrors about hidden failings, secret doubts. We only have to hear the term “unforgiveable sin” once to be sure we’re guilty of one of those! Yet nowhere in the gospels does Jesus ever say: Show me your sins. He does say: Show me your faith; that is, our trust in him. And with that simple movement of trust, Jesus reclaims all that’s lost. There are a lot of people in this world to love, and one thing is for sure: the more people we love, the more we’re going to suffer in seasons of loss. But that certainty never stops us from loving. Because the loving itself is good. The capacity of our love is the most reliable dimension of a full life. God, the source of life and love, understands this very well. Jesus is resolved not to let all of this love be lost or go to waste. So we hold onto our loved ones, in life and in death. And God, we can be sure, is holding onto us. Related scripture links Expiation for the dead: 2 Macc. 12:38-46 Prayer of intercession demonstrated: Gen. 18:20-32; Exod. 32:11-14; 34:8-9; Num. 14:13-19; Amos 7:1-6 Jesus intercedes for us: John 17:6-26; Heb. 7:25

Authors Alice Camille

Trust Faith

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In other words

02 Nov 2014 - Commemoration of All the Faithful Departed (All Souls’ Day), Cycle A

Jesus said, “I am the Bread of Life. The person who aligns with me hungers no more and thirsts no more, ever. I have told you this explicitly because even though you have seen me in action, you don’t really believe me. Every person the Father gives me eventually comes running to me. And once that person is with me, I hold on and don’t let go. I came down from heaven not to follow my own whim but to accomplish the will of the One who sent me. “This, in a nutshell, is that will: that everything handed over to me by the Father be completed—not a single detail missed—and at the wrap-up of time I have everything and everyone put together, upright and whole. This is what my Father wants: that anyone who sees the Son and trusts who he is and what he does and then aligns with him will enter real life, eternal life. My part is to put them on their feet alive and whole at the completion of time” (from John 6). Taken from The Message: Catholic/Ecumenical Edition by Eugene Peterson (ACTA Publications, 2014 ); actapublications.com; 800-397-2282.

Trust

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Exploring the word

22 Dec 2013 - Fourth Sunday of Advent, Cycle A

In God we trust. It must be true: We print it on our money! It’s interesting that we confer this sentiment on currency—the one thing we’re tempted to trust more than God. Maybe it was originally put there as a warning: Don’t trust the dollar over the giver of all good gifts. Most of us do trust in God—that is, until we don’t. That point is often reached when things don’t go the way we want or expect. When we become ill or our relationships go awry; when our fortunes or projected futures change drastically; when all those coins and bills which remind us to trust in God are gone—that’s when we’re tempted to question God’s watchfulness or intentions. We may even wonder if God is there at all. We see how thin human trust in God’s benevolence is in the story of King Ahaz before Isaiah. The prophet tells the king that God wants to give him a sign as a pledge that things are progressing as they should so the king can place his confidence more deeply in the divine promises. Ahaz betrays his fear of God—not the “fear of the Lord” that denotes reverence but a terror of committing his future to God’s purposes. He wants to place his trust in his advisors and military planners, not in the oracles that come mysteriously from heaven through the mouth of Isaiah. Exasperated by the king’s response, Isaiah delivers the “Emmanuel prophecy”—no, not a new thriller novel or movie but among the most famous and significant of all Old Testament prophecies. The sign that Ahaz doesn’t want will be a child who is God-with-us. Not only does this God-shy king get a sign, but it’s one that brings the God he fears even closer to the world’s business. Next we hear another story of a man who is God-fearing, but in a good way. Eight long centuries after the time of Isaiah, this man Joseph is invited to trust radically in God’s promises in a most unusual situation. Joseph is no king; far from it. No prophet comes to his door to deliver the news. Up to now Joseph has relied on religious law to be his counsel in doing the right thing. To a good man not handicapped by pride, however, the law in this circumstance seems too harsh. Yet at the least custom calls for the termination of the agreement, which Joseph is persuaded to do, until an angel in a dream invites him to trust in God more deeply than most of us can imagine doing. The words of Isaiah resurface in this dream and finally they find a man willing to believe them. “In God we trust” isn’t only a saying for money. As Joseph understood, it’s about the next decision. Related scripture links The measure of righteousness: Lev. 19:36; Deut. 25:15, 33:19; Job 31:6; Ps. 4:6; 23:3, 51:21; Ezek. 45:10 Paul’s righteousness attested: Phil. 3:4-11 The freedom of the children of God: Gal. 4:1-7; 5:1-6 Jesus as lord of the Sabbath: Matt. 12:8; John 5:16-17 Punishment for unchastity: Deut. 22:23-27 Catechism links Birth of Jesus: CCC 430-440; 496-498 Angels: CCC 328-336 Obedience: CCC 143; 2087

Authors Alice Camille

Trust joseph

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Sign & sacrament

17 Nov 2013 - Thirty-third Sunday in Ordinary Time, Cycle C

If you pay attention to the news, it wouldn’t be too much to think the world is going to you-know-where in a handbasket. Violence, crime, corruption, illness, poverty, ignorance, and plain old self-centeredness seem to rule the day. In Jesus’ time some said those kinds of things were signs of the end of the world. Christ himself knew the list: “powerful earthquakes, famines, and plagues from place to place.” But he also urged caution: “When you hear of wars and insurrections, do not be terrified . . . it will not immediately be the end.” In other words, whatever is going on in the world, we are not to be afraid. We can trust in God and do what we can for the cause of goodness.

Trust fear

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