Guest Column
Our Sunday Visitor
The timing of the Extraordinary Jubilee Year of Mercy, which opened Dec. 8, is providential.
It comes at a time when the world is dumbstruck by the massacres in Paris and Mali, and across the Middle East and much of Africa, murder is committed in the name of religion and for the sake of power.
Here in the United States, we are debating whether to accept refugees fleeing these war-torn countries because our fears of terrorism outweigh our generosity. This year will encompass our bitter and angry national election. The Internet is full of mercilessness and venom, and the streets of our cities are full of division and distrust.
This Jubilee Year of Mercy proclaimed by Pope Francis comes at a time when so many of us are feeling anything but merciful. Vengeance, fear, anger, resentment, envy: yes. Mercy, not so much.
Pope Francis, who has echoed his predecessors in declaring the centrality of mercy in the church’s mission and message, has observed that mercy “seems to have dropped out of use” in the modern lexicon. Indeed, one of the most common uses of the word mercy is now associated with death: mercy killing.
So how providential it is that when our age is barren of mercy, the church is reminding us that mercy is at the heart of the Christian witness. The good news we proclaim is that “the Lord is kind and merciful,” that God’s “mercy endures forever.” In Advent, we are reminded that the greatest act of mercy of all history was God sending his Son to redeem us; the innocent saving the guilty.
Mercy is the most radical of messages in a world where survival of the fittest and the most unforgiving is more the order of the day. Mercy calls for the virtue of humility, for we who know that our own salvation depends on God’s mercy are called to bring a message of mercy to our families, our communities, our nation. Mercy does not require us to turn a blind eye to sin, nor does it deny justice. Mercy goes beyond justice, however. In the Gospel story of Jesus and the adulteress, Jesus recognizes the sinfulness of the woman (“Go and sin no more”), yet saves her life – despite what the law says is the punishment for adultery. He does so by identifying the sin in the hearts of those who were about to stone her, making it clear that they, too, were in need of God’s mercy.
This Holy Year is a blessing from God, calling all of us to acknowledge the mercy we have experienced and to share that mercy with others, perhaps in the following ways:
– Share it in our families, where mercy is sometimes the most lacking and the most needed. In the family, mercy can be found in the smallest of gestures, yet sometimes is the most difficult to show.
– Share it in our parishes and dioceses, where the pope invites us to make pilgrimages, to put into practice the corporal and spiritual works of mercy, to reach out to those who may feel most unloved or unwelcome.
– Share it in our nation, where the powerful witness of mercy may be an antidote to the anger and the bitterness that seems so prevalent.
In the psalms and the parables, in the lives of the saints and teachings of the popes, in the words of the Mass that we say every week, lessons of mercy abound. This week, Catholics should begin a yearlong reflection on the mercy we have received and the mercy we are being called to live.
(This editorial first appeared in the Nov. 24 issue of Our Sunday Visitor, a national Catholic newsweekly based in Huntington, Indiana. It was written by the newspaper’s editorial board.)

kneading faith
By Fran Lavelle
This is a very special year and a very special Christmas season as we begin the Jubilee Year of Mercy. While “mercy” is a very common word in our vocabulary, what exactly does it mean? Mercy for many of us was the proclamation we were expected shout out when an older sibling had us in a death grip.
But for our purposes, mercy is the compassionate treatment of those in distress. Mercy is a virtue that, when possible, inspires us to alleviate their distress. The Church encourages us to exercise this virtue through the corporal works of mercy: to feed the hungry; to give drink to the thirsty; to clothe the naked; to shelter the homeless; to visit the sick; to ransom the captive; and, to bury the dead.  We find these directives rooted in Christ’s teaching in Scripture:
“Then the king will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father. Inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, a stranger and you welcomed me, naked and you clothed me, ill and you cared for me, in prison and you visited me.’
Then the righteous will answer him and say, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you drink? When did we see you a stranger and welcome you, or naked and clothe you? When did we see you ill or in prison, and visit you?’ And the king will say to them in reply, ‘Amen, I say to you, whatever you did for one of these least brothers of mine, you did for me.’” – Matthew 25:34-40
Christmas is a great time to focus on our many blessings and share our abundance with others.  Some parishes participate in local community angel tree programs, purchase special holiday foods for food pantries, or purchase gifts for the children of inmates of our county and state penal institutions.
Some families have their own traditions by doing something special for a neighbor, friend or family member in need.  Some of you may visit a local children’s hospital or old folks home to sing Christmas carols to the residents.  All of these big and little acts are works of mercy.  They are all lovely ways to celebrate Jesus’ birth.  Moreover, they are intentional ways honor the directive he gave us in loving neighbor as self.
During the days of Advent between the Thanksgiving and Christmas it is easy to be reminded of our need to care for one another.  There are bell ringers at every shopping outlet in town ringing clear that the time of giving is here.
But what do we do when the angel trees are put away and the bell ringers have gone home and all other outward symbols of the suffering of others are retired for another year? How do we keep ourselves accountable to the suffering and distress of those around us? For each one of us we must find our place of service as our gifts are different so they will be manifested in different circumstances.
We must make it a priority to give or do as we are called. Several years ago, when I was working as a lay missioner with the Glenmary Sisters, my brother lamented that he seemed to not have the time to “do” for others and felt like all he was doing was writing a check. He is a husband and the father of five beautiful (and busy) girls, he is a son, a brother, a friend, the assistant dean of a major university’s college of engineering, and is a textbook author.
I told him that people in the ministry of mercy need check writers and there are seasons of life when writing a check is totally appropriate. I reminded him that when his “sorority” house of daughters empties and the expectations of his professional life lessen he would have time to do more than write a check. Some times our expression of mercy is as simple as taking food for a luncheon after a funeral or driving an elderly neighbor to the doctor’s office.
The important thing is that we are intentional about making mercy a priority in our life.  If we want to be better at something, we practice.  In practicing these corporal works of mercy, we recognize and build up the dignity of the human person. We see God’s perfect imprint not only in ourselves, but in those not known to us.
They, then, are no longer strangers, they are members of the family of God.  These are opportunities for grace in our daily lives. In exercising the works of mercy, we truly follow the commands that Christ gave us.
Merry Christmas and a Happy (Merciful) New Year!
(Fran Lavelle is the Director of Faith Formation for the Diocese of Jackson.)

IN EXILE
By Father Ron Rolheiser, OMI
Some years ago I was challenged by a bishop regarding an article I’d written. We were talking in his office and the tone eventually got a little testy: “How can you write something like that?” he asked. “Because it’s true,” was my blunt reply. He already knew it was true, but now, realizing that, he became more aware of his real agenda: “Yes, I know it’s true, but that doesn’t mean it should be said in that way in a Catholic newspaper like ours. This isn’t a university classroom or the New York Times. It’s a diocesan newspaper and that’s not the best context within which to say something like that. It will confuse a lot of readers.”
I’m not immune to pride and arrogance and so my spontaneous reaction was defensive. Immediately there were certain voices in me saying: “I am only saying what’s true. The truth needs to be spoken. Why are you afraid to hear the truth? Are we really doing people a favor by shielding them from things they’d rather not hear?”
But I’m glad I swallowed my pride, bit my tongue, muttered a half-sincere apology, and walked out of his office without saying any of those things out loud because, after my initial feelings had subsided and I’d had a more sober and prayerful reflection on our conversation, I realized he was right.
Having the truth is one thing, speaking it in a place and a manner that’s helpful is quite another. It’s not for nothing that Jesus challenged us to speak our truth in parables because truth, as T.S. Eliot once quipped, cannot always be swallowed whole and the context and tone within which it is spoken generally dictate whether it’s helpful or not to speak it at a given time or to a given person. Simply put, it isn’t always helpful, or charitable, or mature, to throw a truth into someone’s face.
St. Paul says as much in his Epistle to the Romans in words to this effect: We who are strong must be considerate of those who are sensitive about things like this. We must not just please ourselves. (Romans 15, 1) That can come across as patronizing, as if Paul were telling a certain elite to tone down some of their enlightened views and actions for the sake of those who are less enlightened, but that’s not what’s at stake here.
Undergirding this kind of admonition is a fundamental distinction that’s critically important in our teaching, preaching, and pastoral practice, namely, the distinction between catechesis and theology, the distinction between nurturing and shoring-up someone’s faith as opposed to stretching someone’s faith so as to make it more universally compassionate.
Catechesis is meant to teach doctrine, teach prayers, teach creeds, clarify biblical and church teachings and give people a solid, orthodox framework within which to understand their Christian faith. Theology, on the other hand, presupposes that those studying it are already catechized, that they already know their creeds and prayers and have a solid, orthodox foundation.
Theology’s function, among other things, is then to stretch its students in function of giving them the symbolic tools with which to understand their faith in a way that leaves no dark, hidden corners into which they are afraid to venture for fear of shaking their faith. Catechesis and theology have different functions and must respect each other since both are needed: Young seedling plants need to be protected and gently nurtured; just as older, mature plants have to be given the wherewithal to live and thrive inside all the environmental challenges in which they find themselves.
Thus the challenge coming to me from the bishop was, in effect, to be more careful with my audience so as to distinguish theology classrooms and academic periodicals from catechetical situations and church newspapers.
This challenge is reminiscent of the example, shown by scientist-philosopher, Pierre Teilhard de Chardin: Elderly, retired, and in declining health, he still found himself “silenced” by the Vatican in that we has forbidden to publish his theological thoughts. But, rather than reacting with anger and arrogance, he reacted with charity and humility.
Writing to his Jesuit Provincial, acknowledges needs beyond his own: “I fully recognize that Rome may have its own reasons for judging that, in its present form, my concept of Christianity may be premature or incomplete and that at the present moment its wider diffusion may therefore be inopportune. … [This letter] is to assure you that, in spite of any apparent evidence to the contrary, I am resolved to remain a child of obedience. Obviously, I cannot abandon my own personal search – that would involve me in an interior catastrophe and in disloyalty to my most cherished vocation; but I have ceased to propagate my ideas and am confining myself to achieving a deeper personal insight into them.”
Recognizing the importance of sensitivity as to where and how we speak the truth, Jesus advises: “Speak your truth in parables.”
(Oblate Father Ron Rolheiser, theologian, teacher and award-winning author, is President of the Oblate School of Theology in San Antonio, TX.)

IN EXILE
By Father Ron Rolheiser, OMI
This is not a good time to be a Muslim in the Western world. As the violence perpetrated by radical Islamic groups such as ISIS, Al Qaeda, and Boko Haram becomes more and more prevalent, huge numbers of people are becoming paranoid about and even openly hostile towards the Islam religion, seeing all Muslims as a threat. Popular opinion more and more blames the Muslim religion itself for that violence, suggesting that there is something inherent in Islam itself that’s responsible for this kind of violence.  That equation needs to be challenged, both in the name of truth and in the name of what’s best in us as Christians.
First of all, it’s untrue: Painting all Muslims with the same brush is like painting all Christians with the same brush, akin to looking at most the depraved man who calls himself a Christian and saying: “That’s Christians for you! They’re all the same!”  Second, it’s also unfair: Islamic militants no more speak for Islam than Hitler speaks for Christianity (and that comparison isn’t idly chosen). Finally, such an equation misleads our sympathy: The first victim of Islamic terrorism is Islam itself, namely, authentic God-fearing Muslims are the first victims of this violence.
When we look at the history of any terrorist Islamic group such as ISIS or Al-Qaeda, we see that it first establishes itself by terrorizing and killing thousands of its own people, honest, God-fearing Muslims. And it goes on killing them. ISIS, Al-Qaeda, and Boko Haram have killed thousands more Muslims than they have killed Christians or persons of any other religion. While their ultimate target may well be the secularized, Christian West, but more immediately their real war is against true Islam.
Moreover the victims of Islamic terrorists are not just the thousands of moderate Muslims who have been direct victims of their violence and killings, but also all other Muslims who are now painted with the same brush and negatively judged in both their religiosity and their sincerity. Whenever Islamic terrorists perpetrate an act of violence, its victims are not just those who die, are injured, or who lose loved ones, it’s also all true Muslims, particularly those living in the West because they are now viewed through the eyes of suspicion, fear, and hatred.
But the Muslim religion is not to blame here. There is nothing inherent in either the Koran or in Islam itself that morally or religiously undergirds this kind of violence.  We would holler “unfair” if someone were to say that what happened during the Inquisition is inherent in the Gospels. We owe Islam the same judgment. One of the great students of World Religions, the renowned Houston Smith, submits that we should always judge a religion by its best expressions, by its saints and graced-history rather than by its psychopaths and aberrations. I hope that others offer us, Christians, this courtesy. Hitler was somehow a product of the Christian West, as was Mother Teresa. Houston Smith’s point is that the latter, not the former, is a truer basis for judging Christianity.  We owe our Islamic brothers and sisters the same courtesy.
And that’s more a recognition of the truth than a courtesy. The word “Islam/Muslim” has its origins in the word “peace,” and that connotation, along with the concept of “surrender to God”, constitutes the essence of what it means to be a Muslim. And for more than 90 percent of Muslims in the world, that is exactly what it means to be a Muslim, namely, to be a man or woman of peace who has surrendered to God and who now tries to live a life that is centered on faith, prayer, responsibility, and hospitality.  Any interpretation of Islam by a radicalized group that gives divine sanction to terrorist violence is false and belies Islam. Islamic extremists don’t speak for God, Mohammed, Islam, or for what it means to surrender in faith, but only for a self-serving ideology, and true Muslims are, in the end, the real victims of that.
Terrorist attacks, like the recent ones in Paris and Mali, call for more, not less, sympathy for true Muslims. It’s time to establish a greater solidarity with Islam, notwithstanding extremist terrorism. We are both part of the same family: We have the same God, suffer the same anxieties, are subject to the same mortality, and will share the same heaven. Muslims more than ever need our understanding, sympathy, support, and fellowship in faith.
Christian de Cherge, the Trappist monk who was martyred by Islamic terrorists in Algeria in 1996, wrote a remarkable letter to his family in France shortly before he died. Well aware that he had a good chance of being killed by Islamic terrorists, he shared with his family that, should this happen, they should know that he had already forgiven his killers and that he foresaw himself and them, his killers, in the same heaven, playing together under God’s gaze, a gaze that lovingly takes in all of God’s children, Muslims no less than Christians.
(Oblate Father Ron Rolheiser, theologian, teacher and award-winning author, is president of the Oblate School of Theology in San Antonio, TX.)

Reflections on Life
By Father Jerome LeDoux, SVD
The greatest threat out there in the uncaring, oft cruel world is what we can conveniently call osmosis. Be patient and go slow with this strange definition. For biology’s sake, osmosis is “the spontaneous net movement of solvent molecules through a semi-permeable membrane into a region of higher solute concentration, in the direction that tends to equalize the solute concentrations on the two sides.”
So, the molecules must be solvent; the membrane, semi-permeable. Believe it or not, that sounds like us human beings. As we go about our daily being, saying and doing the everyday things of life, we are ever solvent and soluble, surrounded by the semi-permeable membrane of our choosing, and constantly interacting back and forth with the solute concentrations of our immediate, intimate environment. In a word, as in osmosis, we absorb people, TV, electronics, etc. in which we are steeped.
In this, you undoubtedly see the huge importance of the moral and social fiber of the people with whom you hang out, the culture of life or death in which you live, the quality of life in the neighborhood that touches you most hours of the day.
We are not just being there and living there. As molecules do in osmosis, we are constantly absorbing into our mind, body and soul, for better or worse, everyone and everything that surrounds us.
Since we cannot choose our relatives, the only choice we have in the matter is that of selecting our friends and associates, although business needs and, to some extent, church and civic duties take our choice away.
Genesis 5:24 instructs us how to be with God, “Enoch walked with God, and he was no longer here, for God took him.” The language of that Scripture is mystical, for Enoch’s daily, hourly walk with God became a life-giving thing more and more by the minute, so sustaining life in him that he did not die. God just took him as he was.
How often do we tell someone, “If you talk the talk, you must walk the walk?” Too many people talk a great fight, but, when it comes to walking with us, joining us in the trenches, they are nowhere to be seen. This is where the osmosis of hanging out with Jesus pays off. Our walk is super strong as long as we walk with Jesus. Thus, in the Holy Blues the slaves sang, “I want Jesus to walk with me!”
Osmosis is at work all over the world and in each nook and cranny. We have numerous ways of stating this. Listen to the familiar, “Birds of a feather flock together” that the old folks never tired of drumming into our consciousness. Of course, it means a lot more than our wonderful world of fabulous birds. It means, as we know so well, that either people of like mind hang out together, or people are drawn to become of like mind by associating with each other – for better or worse!
Colonel Chaplain Louis Verlin LeDoux has special permission from his bishop in Tacoma, Washington, to maintain his own chapel – Blessed Sacrament and all – in  his home. It is the most prized part of his life, the topic of most frequent mention in the course of conversations. Morning prayer and Mass are a given, of course. From there it starts to turn almost into an über-monastic sort of thing.
My big brother “Verl” definitely would not like what I am writing here, for he is a private kind of guy who has no truck with this manner of speaking about one’s personal business.
My elder by three and a half years, Verl was ordained a priest on Dec. 27, 1952, at Sacred Heart Church in our hometown, Lake Charles, La. After pastoring three years at St. Mary Church in smallish Port Barre, La, his bishop, Jules B. Jeanmard, of the Diocese of Lafayette allowed him to become a chaplain in the U.S. Air Force.
Among numerous other assignments over a span of 35 years, Verl spent a horrendous year in Vietnam at its worst, experiencing such things as seeing an airman riding in a jeep with him cut in half by machine gun fire, spattering Verl with blood. Returning to the States, he did a lot of pacing back and forth for almost a year, constantly praying the rosary and drinking more coffee than the law allows.
Anyway, this same Verl hangs close to his home chapel now, spending at least four hours each day in the chapel. Is that über-monastic or what? Spending “Holy Hour” in church demands much attention and concentration. But four hours, even if spread over the day? My Lord!
I would rate that as very high spiritual osmosis where we take on the characteristics of Father/Jesus/Holy Spirit by their nearness. I’m whispering in your ear – don’t let Verl know that I told you these things.
I would like to think that most of the people around us are not only pleasant but good by every measure of body, mind, heart, nerves, emotions, especially soul.
“God is love, and all who abide in love abide in God and God in them.”   (1 John 4:16)
(Father Jerome LeDoux, SVD, retired to Sacred Heart Residence in Bay St. Louis He has written “Reflections on Life since 1969.)

Word on Fire
Bishop Robert Barron
Just after I was named auxiliary bishop of Los Angeles, Archbishop Gomez, my new boss, told me to get the Waze app for my iPhone. He explained that it was a splendid way to navigate the often impossible LA traffic. I followed his instructions and have indeed used the app on practically a daily basis since my arrival on the West Coast. Waze not only gives you directions, but it also provides very accurate information regarding time to your destination, obstacles on the road, the presence of police, etc. Most importantly, it routes you around traffic jams, which positively abound in the City of Angels.
Especially in my first days and weeks on the new job, I basically had no idea where I was going — and my duties required that I be all over the place: LAX, Pasadena, Inglewood, Granada Hills, Ventura, Oxnard, Santa Barbara, Santa Maria, etc., etc. And often I was required to journey after dark.
So I would program an address into the Waze app and then listen to the mechanical female voice as she guided me to my destination. It was often the case that her instructions were counter-intuitive, which was not surprising, given the fact of my disorientation in a new environment. But I gradually learned to trust her as, again and again, she got me where I needed to be.
I’ll confess that my faith in her was sorely tested a few weeks ago. I had left my home in Santa Barbara very early in order to attend a ten o’clock meeting in Los Angeles and was making pretty good time on the 101 expressway. Suddenly, the Waze lady instructed me to get off the highway a good 25 miles from LA. Though skeptical, I followed her advice. She subsequently sent me on a lengthy, circuitous, and rather slow journey through city streets until finally guiding me back to the 101!
I was so frustrated that I pounded my fist on the dashboard and expressed (aloud) my dismay. When I got to the meeting, I laid all of this out to one of my episcopal colleagues and explained that I thought there was a glitch in the system. “Oh no,” he quickly responded, “there was a tanker spill this morning on the 101, not far from where she made you exit the road. She probably saved you an hour or two of frustration.”
At that point I saw clearly something that had been forming itself inchoately in my mind, namely, that the Waze app is a particularly powerful spiritual metaphor. As Thomas Merton put it in the opening line of his most famous prayer: “My Lord God, I have no idea where I’m going.” Spiritually speaking, most of us are as I was when I arrived in Los Angeles: lost, disoriented, off-kilter.
But we have been provided a Voice and instructed to follow it. The Voice echoes in the Scriptures, of course, but also in the depth of the conscience, in the authoritative teaching of the Church, in the wise counsel of spiritual directors, and in the example of the saints. Does it often, indeed typically, seem counter-intuitive to us?
Absolutely. Do we as a matter of course ignore it, presuming that we know better? Sadly, yes. Are there some among us who, in time, learn to trust it, to guide their lives by it, even when it asks them to go by what seem circuitous routes? Happily enough, yes.
There is another feature of the Waze app worth considering in this spiritual context. When you get lost or perhaps decide that you know better than the navigator, she doesn’t upbraid you or compel you to return to the route she had originally chosen.
She calmly recalculates and determines the best way to get to your goal, given the choice you have made. God indeed has a plan for each of us. He has determined, in his wisdom and love, the best way for us to get to our goal, which is full union with him. But like Israel of old, we all wander from the path, convinced that we are brighter than the Lord of the universe, or perhaps just enamored of asserting our own freedom. But God never gives up on us; rather, he re-shuffles the deck, recalculates, and sets a new course for us.
Watch this process, by the way, as the Scriptural narrative unfolds. And watch it happening, again and again, in your own life: what looks like a complete dead-end turns into a way forward; the wrong path turns, strangely, into the right path.
No matter where you go, Waze can track you and set you on the right road, and this “all-seeing” quality has given us confidence in its direction. As we have learned to trust the mechanical voices of our GPS systems in regard to the relatively trivial matter of finding our way past traffic jams, so may we learn to trust the Voice of the one who, as the Psalmist puts it, “searches us and knows us and discerns our purpose from afar.”
(Bishop Robert Barron is an auxiliary bishop of the Archdiocese of Los Angeles and the founder of Word on Fire Catholic Ministries.)