I cannot believe that my final days here at St. John have come so quickly. These final days are days that I thought were far, far into the future, yet here we are on the day that marks the birth of our nation and I must take the next step and move on to the next parish I have been called to serve. As I leave, I want all of you to know how much you mean to me.

The other day I was reading through a Bible commentary when I happened on an interesting fact that I had not known before. According to that commentary, in the ancient world, Greek warriors had a practice that often made them invincible in battle.

Greek soldiers went into battle in pairs so that when the enemy attacked, the pairs could draw together back-to-back, covering each other’s blind side. The term the Greeks used for one’s battle partner was the word Paraclete. Does that word sound familiar? It should. It was the word Jesus used just before He was to return to the Father when He promised His disciples that He would send them the Holy Spirit to be with them as their “paraclete”.

Pulitzer Prize-winning author Alice Walker wrote something about her father that I have always remembered: “When I was a little girl, I accidentally broke a fruit jar. Several brothers and sisters were nearby who could have done it. But my father turned to me and asked, “Did you “break the jar, Alice?” Looking in his large brown eyes, I knew he wanted me to tell the truth. I also knew he might punish me if I did. But the truth inside me wanted badly to be expressed. “I broke the jar, I said. The love in my father’s eyes rewarded and embraced me. Suddenly I felt an inner peace that I can still recall with gratitude to this day.” Alice Walker’s loving account of that day with her father always reminds me of how deeply we are all loved by God.

The other day I was in a store browsing through the computer department. As I was looking at a laptop computer, one of my fellow customers struck up a conversation with me. “I have a laptop at home that is just four years old. “He said. “My son tells me it’s a “dinosaur” that needs to be replaced. Can you imagine, it’s still new in my book, but my son insists that it must go?” Before I could even reply to the man, his son approached and said, “Let me show you what you need to buy to replace that old computer.” “But I’m just getting to know that computer!” the man protested. As I watched all of this unfold I began thinking how our whole culture is becoming disposable.

This time of the year, as we begin to celebrate graduations and the ending of one phase of life and the beginning of new adventures for all of the graduates, it is important for us to take a few moments to consider how we truly shape one another’s lives.  The Indian poet, Tagore, wrote one particular line which can be of help in looking at this:  “After you had taken your leave, I found God’s footprints on my floor.”  

There is a Zen story that I like which reminds us to, as the moral suggests, pay attention to how we look at things. According to the story, a small snail feeling a bit hungry began to climb a cherry tree. It was a rather cold, windy day in late spring. It happened that some birds were watching as the snail began to make its way up the tree. “What are you doing?” one of the birds said to the snail. “Why, I’m climbing up this tree to get a cherry, I’m famished!” said the snail. The birds all had a good laugh at the snail’s expense. “You’re an idiot!” said one of the birds. “Don’t you see there are no cherries on that tree; just how dumb are you?” The snail did not stop, however, but continued up the tree.

I’ve been thinking about a character in a novel I read a few years back. The character I’m thinking about was a prisoner in a Soviet work camp. Conditions in that concentration camp were absolutely horrendous and many inmates died due to the appalling conditions. The character I have been thinking about was awakened one morning at four o’clock, given a piece of bread and sent out to work in a warehouse. The man thought to himself, “I had better hold on to this piece of bread because I may need it through the night. At night I am so hungry that I cannot sleep and if I don’t sleep, I’ll never have the strength to endure tomorrow.” After working all day, the man fell exhausted into his bed and pulled the thin blanket he had been given up over his head to try to stay warm.

Someone recently gave me a book about marine biology. I have no idea why they thought I would like it, but I did spend about 45 minutes reading through some of it and found some rather fascinating facts.

I read recently about an eleven year old boy, Trevor Ferrell, from Philadelphia, who went into the city one day with his parents. In the course of the day, Trevor came upon a homeless man in the street, sleeping. Trevor was absolutely shocked that this man had no home, no bed or place to sleep. That night, as Trevor was trying to sleep, he knew he had to do something. The next day he gathered up his own sheets and blanket and pillow and put them in a bag.

I read an article the other day by a woman who is worried for her children. She says she is worried because she thinks that the world is moving way too fast so that children can no longer be properly cared for. She put it this way, “Our children lie wounded on the ground, run over by our high-speed intentions. We all want to do good for them, as long as it doesn’t take too long.”

I went to a lecture on prayer one time. It was rather dull. I didn’t like it at all. I thought of five or six other people that I thought ought to be giving the lecture that would have done a much better job. I got a bit frustrated. Finally, about a third of the way through the talk, I stopped listening and began to think of other things I’d rather be doing. I looked over at another priest, a friend of mine, and he looked as if he were in awe of what was being said. I was amazed that he was so absorbed by what I thought was a rather dull monologue.

In the last few weeks I have been seeing, in many different places, copies of a print of Danny Hahlbohm’s painting which has the title “Reunion”. The painting shows Jesus wrapping his arms around a man who has apparently just arrived in heaven. There is a dove hovering over the two embracing figures and there are two hands that come out of the clouds. It is meant to remind us that the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit will be there to welcome us when our journey on earth is at an end.  The look on Jesus’ face is one of great joy and it is obvious that the man is receiving a joyful welcome home.

Agents of HopeFr. Mark BurgerPalm Sunday 3/28/2010 

One fact about life today is that, for most people, it moves at a rapid pace. Although speed can be a good thing in some instances, when speed ends up becoming haste, it becomes caustic. It begins to eat away at one of the great gifts that Jesus left us, the gift of peace.

How about a story? Here’s a story to take to your prayer as we continue with this great Season of Lent. 

I recently read about an 87 year old woman who is one of those people we all know who is just full of very practical, down-to-earth wisdom. According to the article, this elderly woman was being interviewed after a hurricane had blasted the East Coast. She spoke of how devastated she was when she watched as the hurricane destroyed the huge pine trees that had been her pride and joy. “Those beautiful trees have been there for most of my life,” she said. “I could look out my front window and just give God thanks for them. I always felt like they were guarding and protecting me. I guess that is literally what they did for me during the storm. Oh my, now they just lay in a pile of total destruction.” She lamented.

 

Recently I read about an event that occurred in the Connecticut House of Representatives back in 1789. According to historical records, one day while the house was in session, a terrible storm blew up. As the members of the house gazed out the windows they saw a sky darker than any of them had ever seen. Terrible flashes of lightening began to fill the sky and deep, rumbling thunder filled their ears. Winds began to howl and trees were uprooted, one after the other. The lightening flashed brighter and brighter, the thunder rumbled louder and louder.

As I was reading at the library this past week, I came across a little piece written by the Pulitzer Prize winning author Alice Walker. In that article Alice recalled an experience from her childhood that even today has a deep impact on her. “When I was a little girl,” she wrote.”I accidentally broke a fruit jar. Several brothers and a sister were nearby who could have done it.

I’ve been thinking about something I noticed when I was on vacation with some friends last year. Part of our travels together involved driving on a toll road, which required us to stop from time to time to pay the toll. What struck me about that experience were the people who worked the tollbooths. In fact, I remember one of my friends even saying, “How’d you like to have that terrible job? Can you imagine sitting there for eight hours a day just making change?

I just finished reading a little article in which Cardinal Mahoney of Los Angeles wrote about what he considers a rather striking image of Pope John Paul II from the days he was visiting the Archdiocese of Los Angeles back in 1987. The cardinal recalled one special night at around 10:30 p.m. when the cardinal went down to the kitchen. Mahoney said, “I came into the kitchen to find the pope’s secretary sitting at the table drinking coffee, and the pope standing at the stove stirring a pot of left over soup. The pope just looked up and smiled at me.

As I was sorting through a bunch of old files the other day, I came across a paper I had written for a college philosophy class. The paper itself wasn’t all that good or interesting, but the title caught my eye. The title of that paper was “The Significance of the Ring of Gyges”. When I read the title I couldn’t for the life of me remember just what the Ring of Gyges was, so I had to read my old paper! Then it came back to me.

 

 There is one thing that is true of our world today and that is that everyone seems to be in a hurry. We all seem to rush from one thing to the next, not even pausing in the least bit before we are rushing off to something else. We are not only in a hurry in our daily schedules and routines; we are also in a rush to get through with things like school. How many high school students are looking to take some college courses while they are still in high school just so that they can "be ahead" when they actually get to college? We just seem to have this need to keep moving and to not want to wait for anything.

 

 

I was in the public library the other day just to sit and read through some of the periodicals and relax a bit.  As I sat reading, an elderly woman came along and sat down on the chair next to me.  She began to open a bag filled with candies, she took a piece of hard candy and began to unwrap it; the noise of the rattling of the wrapper caused me to look up from my reading. She smiled at me and said, "I see you are reading some magazines."  I said yes and that I enjoyed coming to the library to read.

 "You look like you'd enjoy reading." She said.  Then she paused and said, "And by the looks of you, I'll bet you'd enjoy this piece of candy too, wouldn't you?"

 

I was reading a novel this past week and came upon this little scene:  There are three men sitting on a bench at a funeral. One of them says to the other two men, “What do you want your family and friends to be saying about you at your funeral?”  The two men thought about it for a moment. The first one finally said, “I’d want them to say that I was a nice guy who took good care of his family.”  The other man said, “I’d want them to say that I was faithful til the very end.”  The two men then turned and asked, “So, what do you want them to be saying about you at your funeral?”  The man replied, “I want them to say, ‘Look!

 

  I spent some time this past week reading about the life of Buddha.  According to the little book that I read, Buddha taught that one should never return evil for evil.  One day, after Buddha had taught a rather large crowd some of his principles, a man came up to speak to him. The man had decided to see if Buddha practiced what he preached. So, as soon as he came into Buddha's presence, the man began to spew out all kinds of insults, using foul language and calling Buddha many disrespectful names.