Fifth Sunday of Lent, cycle C

John 8:1-11

People who hear this story of the woman caught in the act of adultery first ask, what about the guy?  Wasn’t he just as guilty?  And then they wonder, “What is Jesus writing in the dirt?” But the story doesn't tell us those things, and so we won’t bother to answer those questions.  And we all agree adultery is bad.  But maybe that’s not the issue either.

This little story was probably not in John’s original gospel.  Some people say it sounds more like Luke, and in fact there are some very old manuscripts that seem to support that some poor old scribe put the story from Luke into the Gospel of John.  There was even a debate about whether the story should be considered part of Sacred Scripture, but the story survived.  It's a dangerous story and one of the early fathers of the Church, as well as a couple of protestant biblical scholars, wanted to leave the story out of the official bible because of the worry that it might encourage people to commit adultery.  After all, if it was so easily forgiven, even when the woman didn’t even ask for forgiveness, what’s the big deal?

But just to set the record straight, Jesus is not ok with adultery.  In fact, Jesus, who does nothing that is not approved by his father, is against all sin, even things we think of as little.  IF you fight with your spouse, not good.  IF you get back more change than you should have and stick it in your pocket, Jesus is not ok with that.  IF you leave bulletins behind in the pews, even that’s not ok.  Some country comedian once said, “I love women best and then whiskey, my neighbor a little, and God hardly at all.” And we laugh uncomfortably because there’s a little of that in all of us.  IF God made us to know love and serve him in this world to be happy with him in the next, as the old catechism said, why is it so hard?  Even the great saints felt this tension.  Our natural instincts seem to be at odds with what God wants from us.

Saint Augustine spent a lot of time on this.  He talked about how he had lost himself in all the pleasures of the world until he finally found God in the center of his being.  He wrote, “You have made us for yourself, Lord, and our hearts are restless until they rest in you.”  When we look at our natural instincts, our natural desires, we see that they all draw us beyond what we think we want.  When we satisfy a desire, sinful or good or neutral, moments later we are seeking something else.  There is no rest.

One theologian said that there are those explicit desires -- love for another person, friendship, a piece of art, a vacation, a good meal, winning at a game or winning in our profession, even desires which lead to sin -- and we see that beneath all of these is a desire for completion, for what will make us whole, a desire for God.  Our human nature does, in fact, direct us toward God.  All human beings live in a state of desire.  Sometimes these instincts seem selfish and even immoral, but ultimately, they make us reach out for what keeps us alive and ensure that the human race keeps on going.

God who created us with all these desires wants us to enjoy the good things he’s made for our benefit.  In fact, he loves for us to do this.  But it’s like my grandfather giving me a pocketknife when I was five.  He didn’t just hand it to me; he made sure I knew how to open and close it without cutting off my finger; he demonstrated how to whittle a stick by pushing the blade away from me; and he told me never to stick it in a pet or one of my friends.  Our enjoyment of God’s good things is accompanied by instructions that are built into us -- common sense is a name for them.  Sin is when we don’t follow the instructions.  

And the implicit desire is that we want what is behind all these good things, all these earthly pleasures; and that’s where Jesus comes in, because he tells the woman caught in adultery to sin no more, or as one translation has it, do not do this sin again.  Sin, even small sins, make it harder to see past those instincts that come from our human nature to what our whole being longs for -- God.  

The Church puts this gospel story close to Easter, close to Holy Week, because it is a reminder that all of us, like the people who turned away from stoning the woman, are sinful.  If we carefully look at our lives, we see that there are things we do over and over again that we shouldn’t.  We see that time is wasted, that we use our resources unwisely at times; that our tempers are not totally under control, and we could go on and on.  If you think you are without sin, think again.  And we are like the woman caught in adultery -- condemned for our sin, and there is nothing we can do about it.  And we are like that woman because Jesus crosses the divide between God and man and is there to rescue us through his passion, death and resurrection. As with the woman caught in adultery, Jesus does not condemn us but offers his forgiveness.   

Fourth Sunday in Lent cycle C

Luke 15:1-3, 11-32

The parable we just read is one of the most popular of Jesus’ parables. It has fascinated people down through the ages. It’s been used to contrast the Jewish religion with Christianity -- usually unfavorably -- forgetting that Jesus told this parable before Christianity ever happened. It’s been used to encourage those who have fallen away from the Church to return. The older son is often held up to show how jealousy can isolate you from the people you love. And of course the father is compared to God -- sometimes, or if you really want to stretch things, he’s sort of the opposite of a prudent farmer, giving in to the son’s demand for his share of the inheritance, sitting around waiting for his son to return, going wild when the son comes home and literally treating him like a visiting nobleman. And I’m not sure anyone really knows what was in Jesus' mind as he told this story. We need to remember that according to Luke, the Pharisees are upset because he eats with tax collectors and sinners, and then he tells three parables in a row about lost things -- a lost sheep, a lost coin, and finally the lost son. But here’s an interpretation you probably haven’t heard yet. It’s a parable about how to be a good steward. How do we rightly use what is in our hands? This parable can be seen as about the man who has two sons.

First thing we notice is that he is generous. He freely gives what is his to give, namely, a share of his property. When the other son complains, the father reminds him that everything he has is his. The father is not only generous with his possessions, but is generous of spirit; He welcomes the younger son back with open arms, rather than making him grovel. And he goes out from the celebration to find the older son, rather than demanding that the son recognize his authority.

The man is loving, that’s the second thing. He treats both sons with dignity. When the younger son gets in trouble, as we all knew he would, the man honors his son’s choice’ he does not ride off to rescue him. The younger son claimed his freedom, his father allows him to make what turns out to be a foolish choice. And when the older son leaves the party and sulks, the father honors that choice as well. He does not order him back to the party, but tries to show him why he should come back. In other words, in the case of both sons, the father treats them as equals, as people who are free to make mistakes, free to choose, rightly or wrongly. We don’t often think about it that way, but that is loving behavior.

Finally the man has a specific purpose in mind -- to find what is lost, to regain what has been taken. He uses his resources to shore up and strengthen the relationships he has with his sons. He does not reject one for the other, we understand at the end of the parable that his generosity does not create a winner and a loser where his sons are concerned.

So we can see that this parable can teach us something about stewardship. It’s ironic that the word Stewardship traces back to Old English, stigwaerd, which means “keeper of the pigpen”

We learn from the parable that being generous is not the same as being wasteful, like the prodigal son, nor is it being stingy, like the elder brother. The man cannot give what he doesn’t possess. Some of us need to learn the lesson that you can’t give away what you don’t have. Most of us don’t have too much trouble where money is concerned, but many of us promise our time and don’t have enough of it to meet our basic commitments.

Second, stewardship is rooted in love. Stewardship seeks what is best for the one who is loved. Do I pay a bill because I have to or because I have gladly purchased something that makes things better in my world or someone else’s. There’s a difference. A good steward uses those resources committed to him to bring good to those around him.

Finally, Christian stewards live with a purpose -- to use what is under their care so that those who are lost can be found, so that God’s kingdom might be brought a little closer. Because a good steward wants what Jesus wanted -- to see the world saved, to bring back the lost, to participate in the work of God, whose generosity is boundless, whose love is everlasting, who even now works through his stewards to reconcile everything to Himself.

First Sunday of Lent, cycle C

Luke 4:1-13

In the first epistle of John, which is a series of instructions on how to live a holy life, John writes “ Do not love the world or the things in the world. If any one loves the world, love for the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh and the lust of the eyes and the pride of life, is not of the Father but is of the world.”  Another translation of this passage is perhaps a little more approachable:  “Do not love the world or anything that belongs to the world. If you love the world, you do not love the Father. Everything that belongs to the world—what the sinful self desires, what people see and want, and everything in this world that people are so proud of—none of this comes from the Father; it all comes from the world.”

John Paul II in several of his weekly talks that came to be known as Theology of the Body, referred to this passage often, especially when he was describing the fall of Adam and Eve.  Adam and Eve were not souls temporarily residing in human bodies; they were really rational animals.  It was never God’s intention to create souls that lived for a while in a meat suit and then spent eternity as kind of a ghost.  God’s intention for human beings is reflected in the creed we say every Sunday:  “I believe in the resurrection of the Body.”  Jesus demonstrated in his own resurrection the nature of the resurrected body -- He could be in more places than one; he could pass through walls; he could know what other people were thinking -- and yet, he could be seen and heard and touched.  Our destiny is not to be spirits but to be perfected human beings who will live forever in God’s presence.

John Paul said that in the beginning these two rational animals, Adam and Eve, received supernatural grace allowing them to make choices that were not conditioned by their emotions or their animal natures.  In the book of Genesis, it says “They were naked but not ashamed”.  In short, everything was in the proper order, mind over body, reason over emotion.  They were given everything they needed to become what God wanted for them.  But then we read about the first sin, the original sin.  It’s sad that this seems to be blamed on Eve, because Adam was standing right there as well.  But in the account of the first sin, Eve first experiences the lust of the eyes -- she sees the fruit pointed out by the serpent and senses that this would be really good to eat. She then gives in to the lust of the flesh, and chooses to taste the fruit.  Finally because she rationally and deliberately disobeys God’s command, she experiences the pride of life -- her will over God’s.  And remember, Adam is there, who because he was given dominion over all the beasts of the earth, could have simply ordered the serpent to get out of there, did not; and he accepted Eve’s invitation to eat of the fruit.  Adam is as guilty as Eve.  And in the next scene, God goes looking for Adam and asks him why he is hiding.  He replies, “Because I was naked.”  and God replies, “Who told you you were naked?”  And the rest is history.  John Paul says that the supernatural protection was withdrawn; now we are subject to the lust of the eyes, the lust of the flesh, and the pride of life, and these encompass everything in our human nature that causes us to sin.

YOu will note that in the story of the temptations of Jesus, the devil begins by tempting him with the lust of the flesh -- turn these stones into bread.  Satan thinks that Jesus is most vulnerable because he is starving.  The second temptation is the lust of the eyes -- Satan shows Jesus the whole world and offers it to him.  And the third temptation is the pride of life -- if Jesus were to go to Jerusalem and jump off the highest building in town, and not plunge to his death, everyone would listen to him; he’d be a rock star.  

And of course Jesus turns down these temptations, quoting scripture.  The devil appealed to what he thought was Jesus’ human nature; Jesus demonstrated that his nature was like that of Adam and Eve before the fall, he was like us in all things but sin.

That’s the reason Jesus is God made man.  Not primarily to show us the best way to be, but by living in our nature, reforming it, restoring it to the way it was meant to be. You and I have been baptized.  Not just a symbol, but a promise by God to assist us in overcoming those parts of our nature that lead us to sin.  As we embark upon lent, let us look at our own sins and try to recognize how the lust of the flesh, the lust of our eyes, and the pride of life bring us to sin.  And we might even make use of John’s passage to examine our own consciences before confession, and make every effort to overcome those parts of our human nature that lead us away from God, just as Jesus did.  

Here's another translation, easy to remember:  “All the things the world can offer to you—the attraction of pleasure, the passion to have things, and the temptation to think the world revolves around you—do not come from the Father. These are the rotten fruits of this world.”

Eighth Sunday in Ordinary Time, cycle C

Luke 6:39-45

Thomas  Merton said, “Nothing is more suspicious in a man who seems holy than an impatient desire to reform other men.”  Jesus says a lot of things today and it’s hard to find a unifying theme.  When he talks about splinters and wooden beams, is he telling us to mind our own business?  Is that an excuse for ignoring things about another person that could certainly stand some correcting?  When he talks about good trees bearing good fruit and not harvesting grapes from thorn bushes, what does that have to do with me?  It seems like an elaborate and long-winded way of saying you can’t give what you don’t have.  And have you ever had a friend who spent a lot of time pointing out your faults?  If you ever did, you probably don’t anymore, unless he or she is a close relative and you can’t get away.

In the early days of the Church, there was a widespread belief that the end of the world was right around the corner and Jesus would be coming very soon to start the last judgement.  You can even see how this belief influenced some of the early Christian communities.  In the acts of the apostles it records the fact that many Christians liquidated their possessions and turned the proceeds over to the apostles, who then used the money to see that everyone was fed and clothed.  Nobody worried about the day after tomorrow.  And in second Thessalonians we meet busybodies who spend all their time criticizing others and offering their advice, and Paul ultimately says that if someone isn’t working, then he should be eating either.  

But on the other hand we meet great saints who gained their sainthood by being effective spiritual directors.  Saint Francis de Sales, Saint Pio of Petronella, Saint John Vianny, and of course many others spent their lives trying to help other people become holy.  So when we read this gospel and think about things, should we be helping each other or should we keep quiet and mind our own business?

One of the beatitudes of Jesus was “Blessed are the pure of heart for they shall see God”.  What is purity of heart? I don’t think we are born with it.  Little kids, cute as they are and fun to listen to, are pretty self-centered.  The smart ones quickly learn how to manipulate adults to get what they want.  But purity of heart means that we live to understand what God wants of us and make it our top priority to do this.  And it requires grace, it doesn't just happen.  A lot of modern Christians don’t believe in Satan anymore.  But I think those people who are trying to achieve purity of heart are the main targets of Sathan.  He doesn’t have to worry about people who put pleasing God low on their priority list.  Sooner or later the world or the flesh will do his work for them.  

There is a psalm that has the lines “Create in me a pure heart, O God; and renew a steadfast spirit in me.”  The writer recognizes that having a pure heart requires God’s help as well as persistence.  It requires two virtues, honesty and humility.  

Honesty means that I have a clear idea of my relationship to God.  I know my faults, I know my blind spots, I know the things that keep me from growing in my spiritual life.  If I don’t know these things, perhaps I should seek spiritual direction, so that I can be helped.  After all, if I’m not honest with myself, I won’t make any progress.  

The second virtue is humility.  Humility is the recognition that I can’t do it on my own.  If I want a pure heart, if I want to see God, I will certainly need all the help I can get.  That’s where the examples of the saints can teach us.  John Vianney, the Cure of Ars, would spend his days hearing confessions and according to his biographers, his nights in prayer -- during which he was subjected to temptation by the devil.  Humility means you are a person of prayer.

If we work on those virtues, by ourselves or with help, purity of heart will follow, and God will answer our prayer to create a pure heart within us.  And once that pure heart exists, He will remove the beam from our eyes and allow us to remove the splinter from our brother’s eye.  And because we have become good trees we will bear good fruit.  

We are about to enter that great penitential season, Lent.  It’s interesting how Muslims celebrate their Lent, which they call Ramadan.  No food or drink while the sun is up.  I had several Muslim doctors in our training program at Baystate when I was in practice.  Because they fasted, they never forgot that they were trying to grow closer to God and purify their hearts.  Over at Saint Mark’s Armenian church, the congregation does something similar--- during lent they become vegetarian.  A long time ago we Catholics fasted every day during Lent except Sunday.  It wasn’t a terribly hard fast -- One full meal, and you could eat two small meals in addition provided they did not equal a full meal.  You were reminded every day that you were supposed to be purifying your heart with God’s help.  What are you doing for Lent?  How are you practicing honesty and humility so that you can bring a pure heart to Jesus, so that you can see God?  This may be the last Lent for some of us.  Let us use it to grow spiritually.  

Seventh Sunday in Ordinary Time, cycle C

Luke 6:27-38

In today’s gospel selection Jesus lays out his prescription for how his followers are to transform society.  Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you.  And he goes on to give us several more impossible commandments.  Lending money to those who can’t repay you?  From the one who takes what is yours, do not demand it back?  From the person who takes your cloak do not withhold your tunic.  Is Jesus serious?  I can see loving my enemies -- in the abstract, of course.  I can even see praying for them, as long as I don’t have to actually deal with them personally.  But that’s not what Jesus is saying.  For Jesus is very serious about action -- love is a verb, not a noun.  

Before I try to put together a sermon, I usually do some research.  I don’t mind looking at other people’s sermons.  What was interesting about sermons people have written about this gospel is how often the illustration has an arrogant person being put down.  An example.  In a small town there was a bridge which was as wide as a single lane.  People knew that of someone was on the bridge you waited until they had crossed before you drove onto the bridge.  One day despite the fact that Mrs. Harrington was on the bridge, Mrs. Thobauld, got on the bridge going the other way.. When they met in the middle Mrs. Harington said, “I guess you didn’t see me.  Please back up and let me cross.  Mrs. Thobauld replied, “You back up.  I’m late for an appointment and In any event I wouldn't back up for a fool.  Mrs. Harrington replied, “Well in that case I will  back up because I always back up for fools”.  

And it was entertaining as I saw so many sermons where a similar story was the main point.  The idea being that someone who followed Jesus’ plan would have the last laugh.  Here’s another bridge story.  Two brothers had farms next to each other.  One day the older brother woke up to realize that his younger brother had dredged an eight foot trench between the two farms and diverted the river into it.  The older brother was furious and after much thought he hired a carpenter to build a fence so that he wouldn't have to even look at his brother’s farm.  The carpenter agreed and the next morning there was a bridge across the water.  The younger brother was half-way across with his hand out, asking for forgiveness.  “I was terrible to you,” he said, “and you have forgiven me”.  And the two brothers reconciled.  And the carpenter told them he had to leave because there were many other bridges to build.  

That’s a nice story also.  IF you follow Jesus’ plan your enemy will become your friend.  

But in real life, most of the time real enemies stay enemies.  You can forgive, you can give up what you're fighting over, you can lend money without expecting repayment, and the enemy is still your enemy.  It’s especially apparent in these days of the internet, where because it’s easy to be anonymous, you can do terrible things to someone, destroy his reputation, even destroy her relationships with her friends.  And you can do it because you can.  Enemies stay enemies.  

Jesus is not elaborating on his new way of life because he expects us to turn our enemies into friends.  His advice is not there so that if we follow it somehow it will shame our enemies.  I think the real point is that Jesus recognizes that living a transactional life is not the way to happiness.  A transactional life means that if someone hates me, I hate them back.  If someone borrows money from me I will count the days till I’m repaid, and if not I’ll sic the law onto him.  And if you take my cloak, do you think I’ll gladly give up my tunic as well?  

I don’t like confrontation; I don’t think most people do.  But avoiding confrontation is part of that transactional world.  If I don’t risk having an enemy, I won’t have to think about the topic at all.  Hermits don’t have problems with other people..

But Jesus wants you and I to be happy, and points us to the example of our heavenly father, who has a lot of enemies, but keeps on giving, because he is pure love and love has to give itself a way.  And the more we give love away, the more love we have to give away.  And when we step outside of the transactional world, where human relationships come down to quid pro quo -- If I give you something, what will you give me?  Then we will be happy.  

Someone once said, “Imagine you meet God and discover that he is your worst enemy?”  Those people who follow Jesus’ commandments don’t have to worry because the only way you can have an enemy is if you let someone be an enemy.  

Martin Luther King said, someone has to cut the chain of hate and the chain of evil in the universe -- and you do that by love. 

Fifth Sunday in Ordinary Time, cycle C

Luke 5:1-11

When I was in medical school, and especially later in my internship and residency, I didn’t realize it then but I was being broken down and put back together again.  I suspect that’s true of anyone who enters a profession or a trade.  You start out with the intention of learning a subject, but  you find yourself imitating those who are teaching you.  

In today’s gospel we see something profound happening to Peter.  This isn’t the first time Peter encounters Jesus.  Just before this passage Jesus healed Peter’s mother-in-law, and furthermore, spent much of that day healing people who came to him because they had heard about his reputation.  Surely Peter knew something was special about this wandering preacher.  But the real change happens when Jesus engineers that massive catch of fish.  OPeter and his partners were fishermen with a capital F.  They owned boats, they hired help, they knew their trade backward and forward.  Peter at Jesus’ request puts his boat out from shore so that Jesus will have a pulpit to teach the crowd.  But when the teaching is over, Jesus does a remarkable thing.  He tells Peter to put out into the deep and cast those nets once again.  

Peter and his partners had been at it all night. That’s the best time to catch fish with nets.  My dad was an ardent fisherman and he would go out at four in the morning to catch fish.  That’s when fish feed.  The conditions are just right;  insects hover near the surface of the water.  When the sun rises and begins to really warm things up the insects go into hiding and the fish retreat into their hiding places.  Peter knew all this, and had just come back from a fruitless effort.  And now Jesus is telling him to put out into deep water in the middle of the day.  No one could hope to catch a fish under these circumstances.  But Peter decides to humor Jesus.  And when the massive catch of fish takes place, that’s when Peter falls to his knees and says “Depart from me Lord, for I am a sinful man.”  

Peter, who knows all about fishing, has his entire world turned upside down.  Something impossible has happened.  Peter realizes he is in the presence of someone more than a mere human being.  He has reached the point where he is ready to be broken down and put back together, and this begins when Jesus invites him to become his disciple and a fisher of men.

We’ll meet Peter again many times in the gospels and the Acts of the Apostles.  We’ll see him progressing and falling back.  He’ll recognize that Jesus is the Messiah of God, an insight that comes from God himself; and then he’ll start telling Jesus what he should be doing.  He will witness Jesus transfigured on the mountain. And hear the voice of the Father.  And the next thing you know Peter is denying that he ever knew Jesus.  We will even see Peter, who has witnessed the resurrection, not know what to do next -- so he falls back on the familiar and tells the other apostles that he is going fishing.  Even after spending three years with  Jesus and witnessing his rising from the dead, Peter reverts to what he knows well -- fishing.  

But then we see Peter’s transformation.  He’s there at the first Pentecost, and receives the Holy Spirit, along with the other apostles, Jesus’ mother and a few others.  He and John go out and preach in the temple-- Just as Jesus did.  He finds that he can work miracles, and heals a man who is lame and later, raises a person from death.  And while it isn’t in scripture, we learn from some of the e earliest Christian historians that Peter suffers martyrdom, crucified like Christ, but crucified upside down because Peter doesn’t think he’s worthy of being crucified just like Jesus.  

Jesus offers Peter the opportunity to become another Christ.  It doesn’t happen suddenly nor completely, but gradually Peter does what Christ does, and in fact becomes the first in a long line of people who take Christ’s place leading the church.

Whenever I think about Peter and his transformation, his becoming another Christ, I can’t help but remember the rich young man who was also offered the opportunity to be broken down and rebuilt as another Christ, but went away sad because he had many possessions.  

Jesus offers each of us the opportunity to allow ourselves to be broken down and rebuilt in his image.  For some of us it’s happening bit by bit; for some it happens more suddenly.  And for some despite Jesus’ offer, it isn’t accepted and they go away sad because they have many attachments.  

Today let us ask, where are we in our transformation?  Jesus wants to make each of us his brother or sister.  He wants to pass on to us a share in his own divine nature.  But over and over again we have to go through those moments when we realize that we have to empty ourselves out if Jesus is to build us up again.  We have to recognize that we are nothing without Jesus.  

Presentation of the Lord, 2025(1)

Luke 2:22-40

Today we celebrate the Presentation of the Lord.  In some parts of Christendom this feast is called Candlemas, or something like that in other languages.  It used to be a day when candles for the liturgical year would be blessed.  And that in turn is related to Simeon’s prophecy when he refers to Jesus as the light of revelation to the Gentiles.  In our Roman Catholic tradition, we are big on candles.  We have the easter candle, which is trotted out for baptisms and funerals, symbolizing Christ’s presence at these major life events.  We have the candle before the tabernacle, a constant reminder that Jesus is present, body and blood, soul and divinity, in the Eucharist which the tabernacle encloses.  And of course we have the candles we use for Mass, showing a connection between all masses, which indeed are basically one perpetual sacrifice we offer to God.  When I was growing up I just assumed there would be lots of candles in heaven.

All we know about Simeon is that he was righteous and devout, and had received a revelation from the Holy Spirit that he would witness the Messiah of God before he died.  After a lot of waiting the Spirit whispers -- this baby is the one! And Simeon takes the baby and offers the prayer that clergy and religious sisters and brothers say everyday in the evening, “Now Master you may let your servant go in peace …”  

For Luke’s gentile audience it’s enough to point out that the prophecy came from the Spirit.  The early Church was Spirit driven as far as we can tell -- kind of charismatic.  But Luke’s churches had JEwish Christians as well, and that’s why Anna is important and why we know a lot more about her background.  She is a true daughter of Israel, descended from Asher, one of the twelve sons of Jacob.  Her life of prayer and her background make her a worthy prophet for Jewish people.  

But think about Mary and Joseph.  They have been through very upsetting times.  Angels, shepherds, wise men;  exile into Egypt, and now another indication that this child of theirs is the Holy One of God.  And what is next?

They go home, they wait.  They do the ordinary things that people do, cleaning, cooking, working at a trade, going to the synagogue -- I wonder whether they ever talked about the remarkable beginning of Jesus’ life.  I wonder if they felt as though it had all been a dream.  Certainly if their boy was the MEssiah, it didn’t seem to make a difference in their day to day lives. 

Luke tells us more than once that Mary pondered these things in her heart.  I imagine Mary, sitting in the candlelight in the evening, mending a garment or sewing on a button, because if she was like my grandmother, her hands were always busy.  Mary is pondering in her heart.  And she is always waiting.  And she has never forgotten that old Prophet who told her “you yourself a sword shall pierce”.  That was the first sorrow, according to our tradition.  The flight into Egypt to escape Herod’s soldiers was the second.  The loss of Jesus in the temple was the third.  The next four sorrows have to do with the last hours of Jesus -- Mary meeting him on the road to calvary, Mary watching him die on the cross; Mary receiving the dead body of her son, and Mary witnessing his burial.  And there were other sorrows as well, I’m sure -- the death of Joseph being one; maybe the day Jesus left home to go on mission.  But at the presentation all these things were in the future.  

And how often in the months and years to come as they watch their son learn to walk and talk, as they teach him how to pray and how to practice trade, how often did Mary and Joseph wonder whether it was all a dream.  This child, this MEssiah of God -- what a responsibility to be his parents.  And they had no direction, they had to do the best they could and deal with each day as it came.  And yet their attention to the little things of life, their efforts to do everything as well as they could, and their utmost trust in God to see that their work accomplished what God wanted of them was what got them through the challenges of their lives. 

Today as we think about the candles let us again remember that God works through us in ways we probably don’t have a clue about.  Let us be comfortable in his presence.