Saint Mary of the Immaculate Conception Roman Catholic Church

Dear Good People of Saint Mary,

Happy new year! It seems right that we end the last year with Thanksgiving, the moment that we come to consider what we have and are thankful for as we step into the new year through the lens of the Advent Season.

Thankfulness is the step in the spiritual life that has to take place before real growth begins. Sometimes people say they get “stuck” and don’t know why they can’t seem to move forward, a block can happen on any level of life, intellectually, spiritually, emotionally. It sometimes happens because a person feels they didn’t get what they wanted, or maybe are  angry because someone else got more. Anger is a big blocker. Learning to be grateful for whatever it is—a little or a lot—is often the key to renewal and a deep abiding peace that  everyone in the world is seeking.

We start with one light in the darkness as the metaphor of this path from darkness of a world without a Savior to a brilliant light in the presence of God-with-us at the birth of Jesus. A Way. From the dangerous darkness of ignorance to the clarity of Truth incarnate. From no hope to founded faith. A Truth. The light grows almost  mperceptibly at first, like a seed in the earth, a grace unrecognized that goes to work and brings us to discover that we are no longer alone. Here there is Love.

There is a remedy to the darkness, an answer to the ignorance and loneliness that can paralyze entire cultures. There is a relationship that changes lives and transforms our night into brightest day.

As I was thinking about this one Advent candle, I realized that I was comparing it to the one great candle that is for us the symbol of new life. We light that candle in that moment of fulfillment, the resurrection of Jesus at the Easter Vigil. At that moment the suffering and death which we have caused with our lives becomes a new reality, a chance for us to change with the silent grace of the Cross. As we venerate the Light of Christ, we realize that the path starts Today, God’s grace penetrates the darkness of our world and begins the process of transformation.

I have taken some of the words of the Easter Exsultet, the ancient proclamation which is chanted at the Vigil Mass in veneration of this Light, and made it a prayer for us at this beginning of time, the first Sunday of Advent:

Lord, This is our night, as when you led our forebears, Israel’s children, from slavery in Egypt and made them pass dry-shod through the Red Sea. This is our night as when your pillar of fire banished the darkness of sin.

This is our night when, even now, throughout the world, you set believers apart from worldly vices and from the gloom of sin, leading them to grace and joining them to your holy ones.

This is our night, when Christ broke the prison-bars of death and rose victorious from the grave. Our birth would have been no gain, had we not been redeemed.

O wonder of your humble care for us! O love, O charity beyond all telling, to ransom a slave you gave away your Son! O truly necessary sin of Adam, destroyed completely by the Death of Christ! O happy fault that earned so great, so glorious a Redeemer!

O truly blessed night, worthy alone to know the time and hour when Christ rises from the dead!

This is our night of which it is written: The night shall be as bright as day, dazzling is the night for me, and full of gladness.

With your sanctifying power take our night: dispel wickedness, wash faults away, restore innocence to the fallen and joy to mourners, drive out hatred, foster concord, and bring down the mighty.

On this, your night of grace, O holy Father, accept our candle, a sign of our solemn offering. Bring us your Peace.

We don’t know what to do with the darkness of our world but, like the growing light of the season of Advent, we start with only a spark of grace and God’s plan grows in us. God’s plan isn’t a concept or an idea for us to agree or disagree with. It is a real plan being revealed in history and put into action with the light of grace that has been placed in your our hearts, yours and mine. Our names are literally written into this plan to be a part of the dispelling of night to be transformed by the light of his day, brighter than the sun, a path that leads beyond the empty tomb. Let us begin.

God bless you,

Dear Good People of Saint Mary,

Several scholars have written books recently about the place of the Church in the world with regard to Vatican II. Some say that the effects of the “Protestant” Reformation were largely unintended. It is true, for example, that Martin Luther went to his death saying that he never intended to start another church. Politics got involved in the dispute, as always happens, and the struggle over who had the power of the universities in Europe at that time became the motive for the Thirty Years’ War that sealed the division of denominationalism.

Some say that Vatican II actually began with the French Revolution, when Church leaders, those corrupt as well as those not corrupt, were rounded up and put to death by the mob. This watershed event, the struggle between Catholic and reformed Christian monarchs caught in a new struggle with a dawning “enlightenment” of
post-Christianity, marked the beginning of the Church’s divestment of temporal power, finally with the loss of the Papal States. Vatican II was the first time that the Church soberly looked at herself as an institution without a temporal kingdom, and sought to clarify what it meant to make a bridge (literally, “pontiff”) between the world and the Kingdom not of this world. She sought to self-identify as one, holy, catholic and apostolic, in the world, but not of the world, without the encumbrances of secular politics.

As much as Europeans might not like to admit it, I think this process needed the witness of the American Experiment to take place. Principles of democracy and equality, religious liberty and separation of Church and State had not really been tried before. Please don’t misunderstand, I believe that Church and State are such that they cannot be mutually exclusive in certain ways as long as people of religion are considered among the citizens. But there is a healthy separation
that must be in place for religious liberty truly to be religious liberty for all, and not just for some. Liberty must be cherished and protected, but religion must also be supported and nurtured.

Looking around today it is a rare occurrence to find a religion existing independently of state government or political power. And religions are at their least authentic expression while being driven by a government. Wherever a particular religion is promoted as the national religion, you will find discrimination, the possibility of forced conversions and, especially where the abuse of power goes unchallenged, extreme abuses and crimes claiming religion as justification. The
reality is that the actual religion has little or nothing to do with these extreme practices, but the government in power has developed a culture with its own propaganda and subsequent history, so it is exceedingly difficult to uncover the truth. Such were aspects of Christianity a millennium ago, to which Vatican II is a stark contrast today.

In the same way, some of us hope for world religions to experience the same self-discovery of their faith and culture in the American context, where religion has the rare chance to exist free from political power. We need to work together so as to let this example shine to other parts of the world where people still know the
oppression of political systems that define their religions and prevent peaceful coexistence. The American Experiment can still shine a light on what is possible. Islam and Hinduism, even some branches of Christianity, have a chance here in the United States to breathe fresh air and learn their traditions free from imposed political ideologies that would otherwise twist and distort their practice.

In such an environment, we might even be able to progress beyond mere tolerance to respect. According to all the relationships we have formed interreligiously here in the U.S., I can tell you that I know of not one event when these abuses, murders, terrorist activities and fear have not been condemned by our interreligious
brothers and sisters.

We do, however, have the ability to sustain the hate and intolerance. With broad strokes it is easy to identify the enemy and lump all people of a particular profile into that category. This is when I call upon all Christians to do the uniquely Christian thing, the one thing that makes us different. If we truly have an enemy, we must love them. We must do good for them, as we would do for a friend. The practice of compassion and loving kindness, which is shared by all religions, is a good starting place. Then, let us use encouragement in friendship as we go about living this American Experiment together.

God bless you.