If you’re going duck hunting and you want to get the flock to come your way, you’ll have to use a “duck call”. If you want to call a buck in the forest, you rattle some antlers. If you want to get a baby’s attention, you’ll use soft round tones and say their name.

These different attempts at communication are shaped by the recipient’s ability to receive the message. St. Thomas Aquinas captured this nugget of human truth six hundred years ago when he said, “Nothing occurs in the intellect (you can’t know anything) if it doesn’t come first through the senses.” Animals respond to biofeedback (heat, cold, hunger, sound). Humans respond to these same things, but having intellect they come to know things through sound—-think words.

This pre-condition for knowing has profound effects on our relationship with God. How can we hear the “Voice of God” who is pure infinite spirit? If you are an angel (pure “spirit person”) you have no body, no ears. There is no need to hear. Angels know things by “seeing” with their mind. In that sense they don’t have to learn; they get things immediately when their spirit “beholds” something. They know God immediately.

As for humans, God has made us in such a way that what we can know must first come to us through our 5 senses. Unless we see, hear, touch, taste or smell something, we can’t know anything about it.

So how then does God communicate to us? He does so by obeying the laws of learning we humans were given to know things. He comes to us through our human sens- es, primarily through seeing and hearing.

Abraham experienced a “vision” of God in which he and his wife Sarah “heard” of a promised child in their old age. What did he do? He believed.

Moses had a “vision” of God at the Burning Bush. He “heard” God say his name – “I Am”. And what did Moses do? He believed. (How you describe their seeing and hearing is a mystery – – no burning bush has ever spoken to me!)

In each case there was given this strange ability to “believe” that God was addressing them. And from that point on, whatever happened became “God’s plan”. Theologians call it “Salvation History” and it includes the events of human history interpreted with eyes and ears now open to what was heard through Faith . . . the bible.

St. Paul makes this literal connection between hearing and faith in the Letter to the Romans (10:14ff).

“But how can they call on him (God) in whom they have not believed? And how can they believe in him if they have not heard? And how will they hear without someone to preach? . . . Thus faith comes from what is heard, and what is heard comes from the word of Christ.”

And in Hebrews 1:1, 2: “In times past, God spoke in partial and various ways to our ancestors through the prophets (Abraham, Moses and Isaiah, etc.). In these last days, he spoke to us through a son, through whom he created all things.”

Of this Son, John the Apostle writes:, “What was from the beginning, what we have heard, what we have seen with our eyes . . . and touched with our hands concerns the Word of life made visible to us . . . What we have seen and heard we now proclaim to you.” 1Jn. 1:1

And what is this word that God speaks? It is the “Word made flesh”, Jesus of Nazareth.

God continues to speak the word of Jesus in the scriptures, the teaching of the church, and the voice of God that is our conscience urging us to “do good and avoid evil”, and lastly God’s word comes at times from the people around us. This is God calling out to us.

Lord give us the ears to hear.

Fr. Tim

This will be a different bulletin article and not one I’m crazy about writing. It’s about “The Spirit World” and what we as Catholics believe about it.

Over my years as a priest I’ve had several people approach me (young and old) about an experience they’ve had with a spirit. They heard a voice or saw a shadow or silhouette in the room. Some have played with a Ouija Board and gotten “a message”. Some have gone to séances to connect with the spirit of someone now dead.

What are we to believe about such things and how are we to treat them?

First off the Bible and our Faith tell us that yes, there are intelligent spirits in the universe. They go by various names: angels, powers, principalities, demons. Both the Old and New Testaments testify to the existence of these “created” spirits in a realm beyond our human way of existing.

A familiar example would be the Angel Gabriel, who served in the classic capacity of an angel . . . “God’s Messenger” to Mary. We believe in the Guardian Angels given to each of us to watch over and protect. (Mt. 4:11, Mt. 18:10)

We also hear, of course, of “evil spirits” who, Catholic doctrine teaches are created spirits who failed the test of freedom to serve God prior to the Fall of Adam and Eve.

Okay . . . so the question for many is, “Can I get in touch with the spirit world?” Various reasons are given why someone would want this. 1. I want to know if my deceased loved one is at peace. 2. I’d like someone to tell me if I should make a change in my life or not. What is my future? 3. It’s fun in a spooky kind of way to entertain at a part.

Our Faith teaches us to be careful here. There is a danger for some well intentioned person to turn to the spirit world as a source of power separate from God.

A person begins to rely on incantations, séances, horoscopes, tea leaves and crystal balls to show them the future or answer life’s questions.

So what’s wrong with that? Simply put, it goes against our trust in God’s providence. God loves us and seeks a personal relationship with us as Our Father. Turning to a Ouija board to show us our future is telling God “he’s not enough” or “Trust in God but consult your Tarot Cards just to be sure.”

There are some things we aren’t supposed to know. God has chosen to keep some things hidden from us. For example – – when God will call each of us home. There is wisdom in this, knowing some things would keep us from living our everyday lives. “Not knowing” helps us turn to God in Faith and trust.

Psalm 131 tells us, “I have not gone after things too great for me. Like a weaned child on its mother’s breast so my soul lies within me.”

So trust in God. Be content in knowing what you know. Pray for those things about which you are concerned and know that God who “knit you in your mother’s womb”, Ps. 139, “knows what you need even before you ask”. Mt. 6:8.

Lastly. Are there spirits? Yes. Do they mess with us sometimes? Very seldom. (I think a rectory I lived in sometime ago had a very timid spirit living in the attic. Really I do. He stayed in the attic and didn’t bother me at all.)

You need to know, however, that any spirit owes its existence from God. God is not rivaled or challenged by spirits. God has complete charge of the freedom He gives to all his creatures and sets limits for them according to His good will.

In the end there is only one spirit to which our knees must bend – the Holy Spirit.

See you at the Snow Ball.

Fr. Tim

W. B Yeats called it the ever “widening gyre” *. The image was of a falcon and the falconer who calls the bird to its roost. The bird has flown to a distance it can no longer see or hear its master. “The falcon cannot hear the falconer. Things fall apart. The center cannot hold.” The poem refers to the forces of history or culture that take a person and a civilization away from their true self.

Something like this happens in every age of history. Its effects appear in our culture today and our young people are most severely affected. We’re losing a sense of our center, our true selves, and what is most disconcerting – – we don’t sense the loss. The forces that separate falcon from falconer are many and complex. To keep it simple we can point to an imbalance of the “inner world” and the “external world”.

The inner world refers to that realization a person has of himself. His center. His likes and dislikes, personality, characteristics and values. It’s our soul, our center. It’s the “me” that turns when I hear my name called.

The “outer world” of course, is that environment outside ourselves; events, persons, circumstances in which we act and are acted upon. Some have called it “the daily grind”.

Between these two poles, my human life happens. I go out of myself to encounter the world and the people it brings. Then I return to the inner world and the conversation begins. “What was that? Why did that happen? Did I do the right thing?”, etc.

These two poles of life, the going out and the returning “home”, need to be in balance. The problem is the world with its unending chatter of social media, news and entertainment, overwhelms the “inner person.” There’s no home in ourselves to return to. We are in turmoil. Things fall apart.

In those rare moments when television or internet are turned off, we can grow restless or slightly embarrassed to be “alone with ourselves”. The sudden quiet catches us off guard and in the silence a weird feeling of being a stranger to ourselves comes over us.

To meet ourselves in such a moment can even frighten us. “Who is this person? It’s ME!!” Oh dear. Me. “What am I going to do with me?”

And so we check our email, text someone, see what’s on TV, phone somebody . . . anything to avoid being with myself.

This estrangement from ourselves has sad consequences for our relationship with God. How can we hear the voice of God if we can’t hear the voice of our own conscience. (that inner voice urging us to “do this.” Or, “don’t do that” Or, “good job!” Or, “shame on you.”)

Remember Jesus telling us “when you talk to God (pray), go to your room. Close the door. And pray to your Father in secret.” Mt. 6:5,6? Why in secret? Because the way God chooses to speak to you is as a friend. And friends give each other their full attention. A friend speaks personally to you like no other, many times quietly, just between the two of you.

In the quiet, over time, we return to ourselves and begin to hear things in our heart once again. I remember one year on retreat at a monastery walking down a country path. Suddenly it happened . . . I heard the wind blowing through the trees. I mean I HEARD THE WIND. I heard it because I was LISTENING.

Later on, if you continue to listen, you can hear the things your heart has wanted to tell God. “Lord, it’s me. I just want to tell you . . .” Many times it’s just being aware of your feeling and giving them to God “who sees.”

So how to end this? Get quiet. Put down the iphone. Come home to yourself. Reacquaint yourself to what you’re feeling, thinking, loving, fearing. Then. . . turn to Him. Speak anything (anything!) you want to get off your chest, be grateful for, need help with.

He is there. “Your Father who hears in secret. . . knows what you need.” Mt. 6:8

That is a promise from Christ. Trust Him.

Fr. Tim

*W.B. Yeats, The Second Coming

Back in the early 1950’s we lived on Bloomfield, a pretty city street in Akron, Ohio. Dad took the bus to work downtown and mom cooked, cleaned, and fed the three Horan children. I remember a big staircase we were for- bidden to slide down and a bedroom I had all to myself.

We rented the house for five years. Then one day, to surprise his wife, dad put $2,000 down on a little Cape Cod north of the city. Mom was furious in that she hadn’t been consulted; but with feelings repaired, the Horan’s moved into their first and only home. Dad was pretty proud. The American dream was coming true. (Mom had still to say goodbye to the dream of moving to Columbus to be near her large family.)

So we owned a home. That’s where I learned to ride a bike and Jimmy Farrell and I would explore the woods behind our street. Patty and Maureen did all the things girls do to grow up. 52 years mom and dad had that house.

I knew the day would come, but it totally shocked me to see the “For Sale” sign in our front yard when I drove back home to see mom (dad had been dead 3 years). “I have no home now”, was the feeling.

I’m sure many of you have a story to tell just like this. The point to be made is, something we all discover soon- er or later, we have no lasting home. St. Paul tells us that all things in this world are passing away (1Cor. 7:31) “Time is running out. From now on let those . . . who buy or own act as though they were not owning, those using the world as not using it fully.”

Why? Because we are renting this body, this space, this time, this home, this family, this parish . . . It’s all passing away. Nothing material is made to last forever. That means we’re here temporarily. We’re renting. We’re pilgrims on a journey.

St. Paul even calls Christians “strangers and aliens on earth.” (Hebrews 11:13) “Those who speak thus show they are seeking a homeland . . . a better homeland, a heavenly one.” vs. 16. This in no way lessens the beauty and wonder of the world and our responsibility to work for a better world here and now. “God so loved the world . . . “ (Jn. 3:16) So do we.

Our “passing through” has huge implications for how we use the things of the earth. Not being “owners” we are “stewards” instead. St. Thomas Aquinas tells us, “We possess external things not as our own, but as common, so that we are ready to give to others in their need.” Pope Francis in his encyclical, Laudato Si, reminds us that the goods of the earth (our water, air, forests, farmland) are given to each generation to be properly cared for so they might be passed on to the generations that follow.

When you think of it, everything we have has been given to us: our home (Mother Earth), our very lives, our family, our country, our skills to carve out our life’s story. And then . . . . . . there will come a time when we have to leave it all behind. We will pass from this earth to enter (once again by God’s gift) Eternal Life.

No more renting; we’ll be home. In the meantime let’s use this time to make this a better world for those who will follow.

Bless your Winter days.

Fr. Tim

Not to sound overly dramatic, but I don’t see how any human being can stay faithful to a life promise (marriage, priesthood, doctor, president, pope) without at some time “saying a prayer”.

I think of my priesthood. Oh, I could have stayed a priest without praying, I guess. The perks are pretty good (free room and board, heated garage, pretty vestments). But without prayer, over time you become a shell of a priest, just going through the motions.

Husbands and wives, you know this too; anyone who tries to commit themselves to a project or a promise sooner or later runs out of gas. The promise you made way back now seems impossible or perhaps in your frustration it appears “unimportant”. “Why should I spend anymore sweat and tears on this darned thing that never seems to get any better?” Been there?

So why is prayer the answer to being “out of gas”? Because it reconnects us to the source of love and faithfulness . . . God. It takes us out of our empty, exhausted, defeated selves and lets us become children again. It lets us experience our neediness without embarrassment. Prayer calls out to God, who Himself has promised to watch over and help us in our times of trouble and emptiness.

“Come to me,” Jesus said, “All you who are weary and heavy burdened, and I will give you rest.” (Mt. 11:28) “Pour out your hearts to the Lord.” (Psalm 62) “Your Father in heaven knows your need, even before you ask.” (Mt. 6:8).

So it’s been a long time. I’ve been away from my childhood religion. I feel like I’m lost in a forest; how do I start praying like an adult? Do I rattle off a couple Our Fathers and Hail Mary’s? Okay. That’s a start. But there is so much more.

Here’s a couple thoughts that will help get you started.

• Gratitude is a wonderful way to get you in the right attitude for praying. No matter what your current mood may be there are some things in your life that “you just know”. (For example, I know my mother loved me. I know my father’s advice about hard work has proved itself time and again.) And I know in the same way there was a time that God answered my prayer OR at least I’m aware He has blessed me with a gift I could never even imagined by myself. Even on a crummy day this thought lifts my spirit. Gratitude. It works every time.
• Once you’re feeling a little gratitude, it leads to a moment of Trust. “You’ve helped me in the past Lord. So I turn to you now, please . . .”Trust that He will catch you as He has in your past.
• Finally there’s the little matter of Surrender. Remember Jesus in the Garden? His whole world was collapsing. What was his prayer (after telling God his own wishes)? “Not my will, but yours (God) be done.”

All this points to prayer as a moment of personal speaking to God who “sees (and hears) you in secret” Mt. 6:6. It ought not rattle on with fancy or churchy words. (When the building is burning, “Fire!” is all you have to say).

Just speak from your heart, “Thank you Lord for the time when . . .” “Dear God you know what happened, please help me . . .” OR just . . . “Help Lord.”

• Now just sit a minute. Don’t do anything. Like you’re on your porch listening to the evening breeze. Look out your window, whatever.
• Lastly. Pay attention to the conversations and events of the week. They often contain God’s surprising answer to our prayers.

This brief conversation with God needs to happen everyday or as often as you can make it happen. If you do this for a while you will begin to experience in a wonderfully vague way(!) God’s presence with you.

Happy winter, eh?!
Fr. Tim

We humans are such a complicated, changing, rational and irrational mix of thoughts and feelings. And yet these are the tools we use to guide our way through life. Which is stronger? Which is right?

As children our feelings are our only guide. Some things make us feel good – some things make us feel bad. So the child keeps doing the “feel good” till it doesn’t feel good any longer. (We all remember eating the whole bag of cookies/popcorn/candy till we got sick.)

Later on life has shown us that not everything that feels good is “good for us”. We learn the word “no” from parents who love us and want the best for us. We learn that sometimes it’s best to not follow our feelings. “No running by the pool.” “Don’t jump on the bed.” “No cigarette sales to minors.”

Most of these thoughts come from generations of trial and error. It’s a low form of what we call “wisdom”. How many of us have lamented that wisdom came too late? “I wish I knew then what I know now. Things would be different.”

So why do we have these feelings if sooner or later they trick us into some really bad choices? (Any tattoos you’d like to get rid of?)

It’s because at their beginning they propose to us a very good thing. Physical pleasure, emotional uplift, affection given and received . . . all these are fine, God given human desires. Feelings are what point us to them and secure them for us. Feelings are wonderful.

The problem is our feelings need a governor (or a cop). By themselves feelings are energy, desire, appetite. They are indiscriminate about what they are attracted to. They’ll chase whatever brings the desired feeling regard- less of the results. Feelings need to be taught their proper purpose.

And what is that? – – – – What’s true. This affection you feel . . . is it true love? The fun gathering of friends . . . is it true? The desire to have some new possession . . . does it serve a truth.

Meanwhile, joined as a twin to the truth is . . . the Good. If something is true, it’s good. If it’s good, it’s true. And what is the source of Good and True? God of course.

So goodness and truth are the guides for our feelings, for what we should want, what we should do. This will at times require us to say “no” to certain feelings. Not out of fear or repression but simply because they don’t serve what is True or Good.

Remember when Jesus was fasting in the desert for 40 days and nights? Matthew, Chapter 4 tells us “Jesus was hungry.” Bread looked pretty good to him at that point. Yum! “Order these stones to turn into bread”, the devil said to him. Jesus of course replied, “Not on bread alone does man live, but on every word that comes from God.”

So feelings. They’re God’s way of leading us to what is true and good, but they need the eyes of Faith to see clearly their proper end. Let us teach these things to our children and show them in the way we live our lives as adults.

God Bless You,
Fr. Tim

This bulletin article was written on January 24, 2016.

(This is a lesson I gave to a class of high school Juniors. See what you think.)

Look around you at all the objects we use every day. They all have a purpose. The pen you have in your pock- et is for writing or drawing. The bowl in the kitchen is there to hold your cereal. Your shoes are there to comfort your walking. You get it.

There is a “purpose principle” that applies throughout the world of nature. The eye was made “to see”, the ear to hear, the hand to hold something. Things work well when they are used in the way the maker had in mind for them.

When used for other purposes the results are not so happy. Ever put your ear buds up your nose? You won’t hear the music and it can be painful !. No, things generally have a proper place and a proper use – – – That’s why they were made in the first place!

And guess what? It’s the same with you. You were made for a purpose. It’s the reason you are alive and living in this world. You have no wings to fly, no gills to swim the waters. What are humans equipped to do that no other creature or object can duplicate? What were you made to do?

Well you’re doing one of your purposes right this second! You’re trying to learn something. Humans can learn and understand how things really are. The human mind is the greatest masterpiece of nature unlike anything found anywhere in the universe.

The second human miracle you performed happened this morning. You kissed someone goodbye (mom, dad, brother, sister) . . . OR . . . later today you’ll call some- one to tell them YOU LOVE THEM.

These are the two great gifts God has given us to make us human. The Power to know and to love. These two abilities belong to Our Nature and make us different from the rest of creation. They make us PERSONS.

But how can I use my powers of knowing and loving in the way for which they were made? There’s all kinds of stuff out there to learn about. Some of it is fun and interesting. Some of it is dark and nasty.

What should I put in my brain that leads me to proper knowing and loving? What should I keep away from? The answers to these questions make up a body of knowledge we call MORALITY.

God made the human being something like God Himself. With our reason we are hardwired to seek what is true. With the power of judgement we can discern what is good and what is evil.

However, the human race has experienced a confusion and a clouding of human judgement (original sin). Along with a knowledge of what is true we also experience a selfish pull (temptation) toward whatever pleases me at the moment.

Reason and judgement must be properly guided if they are to function as God intended. Here are the guiding moral principles God gives us in determining right from wrong.

• Natural Law. These principles are written into the very substance of our natural world. For example: moderation in what we eat or drink. How we treat our bodies. Respect for nature, its seasons, its treasury of air, water, plant and animal life.
• The Ten Commandments. The 4,000 year old code of human behavior given through Jewish history and accepted in some form by every major world religion.
• Teachings of Jesus. Christian morality contains the two above but adds the words of Jesus to move human behavior to even greater depths of love and goodness. EG. “Love your enemies, bless those who persecute you.”
• The Teachings of the Church. Using all the above, the Church guides us to right behavior in many human situations EG. Care for the poor, proper sexual relations, sanctity of human life in the womb, the rights of workers, justice for the weak and vulnerable.
• Wise and learned guidance by recognized authorities in the spiritual and moral life. EG. The growing opposition to the death penalty, increased awareness of a moral responsibility toward the environment.

No quiz. Just thought you’d like to know.

Fr. Tim

Do you like fancy words? They can be fun sometimes just because they sound cool . . . anaphora, oxymoron, protean (look ’em up!).

Here’s your word for the Christmas Season – – – Incarnation. It means “to become flesh”. It’s what happened when your dad winked at your mom and she smiled back. Their love became incarnate . . . in you!

And that’s what happened when Mary said “Yes” to the Holy Spirit. God became incarnate in the child Jesus. The whole Christmas Season echo’s this one astounding fact – God the Invisible One has become a human being . . . and that means “in the flesh”.

Below is a little story we’ve printed before. I like how it captures both the astounding presence of God and the simple cooing of a baby.

The Infant God

Every once in awhile you come across a story that captures a profound mystery and puts it in words that help us see it more clearly. This little gem was written by a Frenchman held captive during the last world war. He was an atheist but also a writer. Asked by his fellow P.O.W.’s to write a Christmas play he includes, as part of it, this beautiful description of the young Mary holding her baby. It touches the mystery of the Incarnation. (The speaker is a portrait painter who is now blind. He is asked by a fellow POW how he would imagine the faces of the mother and child.)

“The Virgin is pale and she looks at the child. What one should paint on her face is an anxious amazement that has only appeared once on a human face. For the Christ is her child, the flesh of her flesh and the fruit of her womb. She carried him nine months and will give him the breast, and her milk will become the blood of God. Momentarily, the temptation is so strong that she forgets that he is God. She squeezes him in her arms and says, ‘My little one.’

But at other times, she remains bewildered and she thinks: God is there, and she is taken with religious dread for this silent God, this terrifying child. For all mothers are also halted at some time before the rebellious member of their flesh, which is their child and they feel like exiles before this new life which they have made with their lives and in whom foreign thoughts dwell. But no child has been more cruelly and rapidly torn away from his mother, for He is God, and He exceeds all the limits she can imagine.

But I think there were also other moments, rapid and fleeting, where she perceives by faith that the Christ is her Son, her little one, and that He is God. She looks at him and she thinks: ‘This God is my child. This divine flesh is my flesh. He is made from me. He has my eyes and this shape of his mouth is the shape of mine. He looks like me. He is God and He looks like me.’

And no woman has had in this way, her God for herself alone, a God so small that one could take him in her arms and cover him with kisses, a God all warm who smiles and breathes, a God that one can touch and who laughs.

It is in one of those moments that I would paint Mary if I were a Painter.”

God bless and keep you in this new year.

Fr. Tim

Jesus, Mary and Joseph. The Holy Family, what a team!. Mary, the mother, was conceived without sin (Immaculate Conception), Joseph (a just and faith filled man) and Jesus, God in human flesh . . . it sounds like a household of Super Heroes. They’re certainly not like MY family.

Before we look at this saintly group, let’s look back a bit at the whole idea of “family”. That familiar picture we have: the house with the picket fence, the kids playing in the front yard;

mom, in her apron getting dinner ready and dad, just back from work, calling out “Honey, I’m home!” – – – is really a fairly recent view of a middle-class home.

To go back a thousand years or so, “family” was more like a “clan” or a
tribe. That African saying “It takes a village to raise a child” is evident in much of history. In primitive times, with dangers lurking in nature (lions!) and neighboring peoples (Those Hatfields!), an extended family was the best way to insure safety and a cooperative way of getting things done.

We see evidence of this in Jesus’ childhood. When he was 12, his whole “extended family” in Nazareth traveled by caravan to Jerusalem. Jesus was gone from Mary and Joseph for a day or so with no apparent concern from his parents. “As they were returning, the boy Jesus remained behind in Jerusalem, but his parents did not know it, thinking he was in the caravan (with the rest of the relatives)” Luke 2:43, 44. They returned to Jerusalem and “after three days (!) they found him in the temple.”

So what does “family” look like today? It comes in many shapes and sizes.

Blended families, single parent families, extended, adopted etc. What does your family look like? Mine has shrunk somewhat. Mom and dad are gone over 10 years so the Horan’s are 3 (Patty, Tim, and Maureen). This is what I mean when I say “I’m visiting family”.

How about your family? Big? Small? Just you? We look at photo’s of Christmas’s past and we smile . . . or tear up a bit. Over the years family changes doesn’t it?

But something about belonging to a family never changes; it’s where we learn how to give and receive love. St. Pope John Paul called the family the “School of Love”. It’s where we learn to live for others and accept others kindness in turn. Family is where we help each other come to know the goodness of God. It’s been called the “Domestic Church”.

Now here’s the exciting part . . . real family, described above, can happen anywhere, with any group of people. Jesus himself pointed to this. Remember the story of Jesus preaching in a crowded house. “Someone told him, ‘your mother and brothers are standing outside wishing to speak with you.’” Jesus said in reply, ”who are my moth- er and brothers?” And stretching out his hand he said, “here is my (family). Whoever does the will of my Heavenly Father is mother, brother and sister to me.” Mt. 12: 48, 49.

It’s a new kind of family. One that is intended and sustained by the will of God. The Family of Christ. The Church in the widest sense, people of good will, seeking to love God and neighbor as Jesus has instructed us.

And guess what? This family is thicker than blood or ethnicity. It’s Father is our Heavenly Father; Mary is its mother. We all are God’s Children. Please help Holy Trinity Church be a part of Christ’s Family by the way we treat all who join us.

Welcome brother! Welcome sister!
Bless this Family.

Fr. Tim

I think I was 12 yrs. old when mom and dad took us on one of our rare family vacations. We went to Mammoth Cave in southern Kentucky. It is a magnificent cavern deep, deep in the ground, filled with stalactites and stalagmites and beautiful crystalline gems flashing brilliant colors throughout the cathedral like cavern.

There are many memories I have of this trip. One which sticks out the most, and one that still speaks to me fifty years later, is the sight of a school of brown trout swimming in an underground stream that flowed through the cave. Generations of these fish had lived on the floor of this darkened cave – – – dark, as in pitch black. Over time something very strange happened; with absolutely no light penetrating the cave these fish had lost their eyes. A thin round membrane covered what would have been the eye socket. It was natures way of saying “use ‘em or lose ‘em”.

So what’s this little Field and Stream article about? It’s about the light . . . and the dark. They are both at work in the world. Both would like to spread themselves as far as they can. Darkness is happiest when selfishness grows, anything that leads to fear and hopelessness is its friend. Despair and ultimately death are its kingdom. You and I feel its pull. We’re tempted to co-operate with the darkness because it’s easy and comfortable. We whisper things to ourselves like, “Who will know?”, “Everyone is doing it.”, “Oh what difference does it make?”, “It feels good, what’s wrong with it?” “God doesn’t care.” And all this likes to hide behind things and in corners that are . . . dark.

Light on the other hand wants to have a party. It invites everyone, no skin or race excluded. It is filled with joy because it is bathed in the truth and goodness.

It wants to see and be seen because what God has created is beautiful. It knows that the source of all that is . . is love. In this light we see and are seen, love and are loved. To walk in the light is why we were created.

Back to the fish for a minute. They too were created to see. But these fish had lived in darkness so long that they had lost their eyes. Darkness had blinded them permanently.

Likewise we humans were made to see, not just with the eyes in our head but by the light of our intellect we see this world. Jesus tells us “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness but will have the light of life.” (John 8:12). But what if, like the fish, we chose to live in darkness? What if we give up on living in the light? Can we lose our ability “to see?” Scripture points to this possibility. “And this is the judgment, that the light has come into the world, and people loved darkness rather than light because of their deeds. . . (John 3:19).

Sooo? This Advent let’s choose the light. Where ever we go, whatever we are doing the choice is always there between light and darkness. (Do I rejoice in what is good or do I enjoy pointing out how bad things are? Am I willing to forgive or am I eager to “get even”? Do I stay faithful to my promise when things go bad or do I give up trying? Etc.)

As The Christopher’s Motto tells us “It’s better to light one candle than to curse the darkness.”

We light the fourth candle of Advent . . . soon He comes. See you at the Feast!

Fr. Tim