The weekend (actually Thursday evening to Sunday afternoon) retreat is over here at White House Retreat in St. Louis. A Jesuit friend of mine is picking me up later and we will go out for supper before I catch a flight back to Milwaukee. Today is the Second Sunday of Lent and the Gospel at Mass for this day is always the story of Jesus' Transfiguration. For me, that event has always been a metaphor for going on retreat, and I talked about that in my homily at Mass today.
Luke's version of the Transfiguation says that Jesus went up a mountain to pray and three of his closest friends accompanied Him. That's what we do when we go on retreat. Just as Jesus took special time away from His busy life to commune with the Father, so do we. We accompanied Jesus up the mountain this weekend to pray with Him and to Him. Being with Him, we received a little taste of glory, just as His disciples did during that first Transfiguration.
The apostles received a taste of glory to prepare them for the difficulties that lay ahead. Soon their faith would be sorely tested when the Master would be arrested, tortured, and crucified. Jesus tried to strengthen their faith for those faith-testing events by allowing them to see a bit of the glory which was normally hidden from their sight. Jesus conversed with Moses and Elijah to show them that the Hebrew Scriptures and the Prophets of old witnessed to Him.
Though Peter wanted to keep the experience of glory going as long as possible by building tents for Jesus, Moses, and Elijah, the taste of glory ended and the apostles had to descend from the mountain and go on with their normal routines. So it is with a retreat. We too leave the mountain-top of retreat and return to our lives in the world. But we take something with us. Every spiritual experience is given to us to build up our faith and that of our brothers and sisters.
I've often heard people sigh at the end of a retreat: "Now it's back to the real world." I'd like to think that what we do when we go away on retreat is to get in touch with the really real world. So often in our busy lives we forget what is most important, why we exist, where we are headed, and how much God loves us. Retreat is a time to get in touch with those things and to have our faith strengthened for the road ahead.
As we leave the retreat we want to savor the words of God the Father which were spoken about Jesus at the Transfiguration: "This is my Chosen Son. Listen to Him." We return to our normal routines knowing that we need to listen every day to Jesus. We do that in two ways. One is to listen to Jesus speaking to us in the living word of the Scriptures, especially the Gospels. The other is to listen to Jesus speaking to us in our daily lives. It's a good practice to pause at the end of the day and to review it: to see how the Lord was present throughout the day, speaking to us through the events and people of our daily lives.
We also need to hear those other words of the Father that were spoken about Jesus and can now be said about each one of us, the baptized. When we were baptized we were joined to Christ, to His Body. We became sons and daughters of the Father of Jesus. As a result, in the words of one of the Prefaces from Mass, the Father sees and loves in us what He sees and loves in Christ. We are chosen. We are God's "choicest" sons and daughters. Our future glory, like Christ's except for the Transfiguation, may be hidden, but the reality is there. We just need, from time to time, to pause and perceive it.
Sunday, February 28, 2010
Friday, February 26, 2010
At the White House
No, I'm not in Washington, D.C. The President hasn't asked me to join the Health Care Summit.I'm at White House Retreat, the Jesuit retreat house in the St. Louis area. Since 1922 they have offered preached retreats based on the "Spiritual Exercises" of St. Ignatius and around 5,000 people a year take advantage of the opportunity to come here on retreat. This weekend there are 66 men on retreat, 9 of them for the first time. It's a silent retreat and during the course of it I will be giving 10 talks based on the "Spiritual Exercises" and I'll be preaching at the three Masses.
I told the group as we started last night that there are three reasons that I am happy to be here. 1) In February it's always nice to go south. Of course St. Louis isn't too far south from Milwaukee; nevertheless it is a bit warmer here. 2) I am a Billiken. For those not-in-the-know, the Billiken is the mascot of St. Louis University, my alma mater. So coming to St. Louis means returning to a place that I called home for four years of my Jesuit life. 3) Giving retreats is one of my favorite things to do. I guess the best way to put it is this: I really believe in the Good News of God's love and His desire to enter into an intimate relationship with each one of us. And like any good news, it's hard to keep to oneself. I very much enjoy having the opportunity to share the greatest news of all time with others.
Monday, February 22, 2010
Arrivaderci Roma!
Goodbye Rome! I flew out Sunday morning and with the sun chasing me across the Atlantic I landed in Philadelphia Sunday afternoon. After a bit of a layover there, I got to Milwaukee by 10 P.M., just in time for a new snowfall.
To give an idea about the meeting of the newly formed international advisory council of the Apostleship of Prayer...
The Apostleship of Prayer exists in an official way in 61 countries. In two of those countries (Ethiopia and Kenya), the national directors are Religious Sisters; in two others (Switzerland and Belgium), they are lay people. In the rest, 57 countries, the national directors are Jesuits, half of whom are over 75 years old. Of the half who are under 75, only 17 have the Apostleship of Prayer as their full-time or primary ministry. Every diocese is supposed to have a Diocesan Director of the Apostleship of Prayer who is appointed by the Bishop, but in the U.S. there are only about 24 dioceses that have such Directors. When I go around the country giving retreats and missions it is not uncommon to meet with a Bishop who knows nothing about the Apostleship.
Thus our little group met in Rome with the International Delegate and our Director General to discuss the renewal of the Apostleship. It is not something that should die. From its beginning in 1844 it has offered to people a profoundly Eucharistic way of living. We "offer up" our entire day through the Daily Offering and in that way find meaning as well as God's will in the daily routines and sufferings of life.
Here in the U.S., I see a renewal of the Apostleship of Prayer going on. A lot of that is due to the Internet, as well as radio and other media. Where in the past people became a part of the Apostleship by enrolling through their parish, today people are finding us on the Internet and becoming part of our prayer community. I won't call it a "virtual community" because it is a very real community that is connected at the deepest level possible--at the level of the heart by means of prayer.
To give an idea about the meeting of the newly formed international advisory council of the Apostleship of Prayer...
The Apostleship of Prayer exists in an official way in 61 countries. In two of those countries (Ethiopia and Kenya), the national directors are Religious Sisters; in two others (Switzerland and Belgium), they are lay people. In the rest, 57 countries, the national directors are Jesuits, half of whom are over 75 years old. Of the half who are under 75, only 17 have the Apostleship of Prayer as their full-time or primary ministry. Every diocese is supposed to have a Diocesan Director of the Apostleship of Prayer who is appointed by the Bishop, but in the U.S. there are only about 24 dioceses that have such Directors. When I go around the country giving retreats and missions it is not uncommon to meet with a Bishop who knows nothing about the Apostleship.
Thus our little group met in Rome with the International Delegate and our Director General to discuss the renewal of the Apostleship. It is not something that should die. From its beginning in 1844 it has offered to people a profoundly Eucharistic way of living. We "offer up" our entire day through the Daily Offering and in that way find meaning as well as God's will in the daily routines and sufferings of life.
Here in the U.S., I see a renewal of the Apostleship of Prayer going on. A lot of that is due to the Internet, as well as radio and other media. Where in the past people became a part of the Apostleship by enrolling through their parish, today people are finding us on the Internet and becoming part of our prayer community. I won't call it a "virtual community" because it is a very real community that is connected at the deepest level possible--at the level of the heart by means of prayer.
Thursday, February 18, 2010
Long Roman Days
It´s late here in Rome...about 9:30 PM. Given our schedule, this is actually the earliest that I've been able to write. Our meetings of the advisory council of the Apostleship of Prayer begin at 8:30 AM and continue into the evening. Tonight was the first time that we were actually free after supper, which is usually late--around 8 PM.
Fr. Fidelis Jaybalan from India was not able to get a visa to enter Italy for this meeting, but he saw God's hand in this because he is being given a different assignment and will no longer work as the coordinator of the Apostleship of Prayer in India. So we are a small group of five: I, who speak English and understand and speak some Spanish; Fr. Frederic Fornos from France who understands English and speaks both French and perfect Spanish because he lived in Bolivia for two years; Fr. Juan Antonio Medina from Uruguay who speaks Spanish; Fr. Rigobert Kyungo from the Democratic Republic of the Congo who speaks French, English, and Italian; and our international delegate for the Apostleship of Prayer, Fr. Claudio Barriga, who speaks English, French, Spanish, and Italian. I must admit it is not easy having a meeting or even communicating at meals with such a diverse language group. Yet we have many things in common, including a love of the Apostleship of Prayer and a desire to see its renewal and spread. Naturally how this will happen will be different in various parts of the world.
On Tuesday morning we shared our vision of the Apostleship with one another and three members of the Jesuit Curia. It was very consoling to see how inspired these advisors to the General of the Jesuits were as we shared with them the important role we see the Apostleship playing in the world. In the afternoon we talked more among ourselves about how we see that role.
On Wednesday morning we met with Fr. Adolfo Nicolas, the General of the Jesuits and the Director General of the Apostleship of Prayer. His words resonated with us, especially with regard to his desire that the Apostleship be renewed for our times, his encouragement that we help people understand what it means to have a well-grounded Eucharistic spirituality, and his challenge that we develop links with many different groups and people. In the afternoon we met again by ourselves to talk about the essential qualities of the Apostleship of Prayer--that it is Eucharistic, Ecclesial, and for Mission. In other words, the Eucharist and our daily offering of ourselves in which we join ourselves to Jesus' perfect offering of himself on the cross and in the Mass insert us fully into the Church from which we are sent forth to bring God's love into the world. We also discussed how the daily offering prayer is not simply a prayer to be recited but one that has to be lived; in order for that to happen there is need for growth in prayer and the spiritual life. We all need, in the words of Pope John Paul II who loved to quote Jesus' words to Peter (see Luke 5), to go deeper.
Today we continued our discussions about how we would describe the program of the Apostleship of Prayer to people of today and then we moved on to some more concrete and practical matters. We heard a report about the Eucharistic Youth Movement whose mission is to introduce children and young people from 7 to 25 to the way of the Apostleship. We talked about a meeting of the Movement that will happen in Argentina in 2012 and about World Youth Day 2011. Then, in the afternoon, we discussed the 1968 Statutes of the Apostleship and addressed the question of whether they needed revision ("yes") and we asked the question for whom the Apostleship of Prayer was meant and if there were groups on which we should in a special way focus our attention. Obviously, the way of the daily offering is for everyone, but in our times it may be especially important for young people searching for meaning, for sick and elderly people who may see no meaning in their sufferings, for busy people who have little time for long formal prayer, and for seminarians who would find this method helpful for the people they will one day serve.
Tomorrow, I will moderate the discussion and act as secretary, writing the minutes of our day up in the evening, when we return from enjoying a Roman pizza. In the afternoon we meet again with Father General Nicolas. It will be a long and full day.
Fr. Fidelis Jaybalan from India was not able to get a visa to enter Italy for this meeting, but he saw God's hand in this because he is being given a different assignment and will no longer work as the coordinator of the Apostleship of Prayer in India. So we are a small group of five: I, who speak English and understand and speak some Spanish; Fr. Frederic Fornos from France who understands English and speaks both French and perfect Spanish because he lived in Bolivia for two years; Fr. Juan Antonio Medina from Uruguay who speaks Spanish; Fr. Rigobert Kyungo from the Democratic Republic of the Congo who speaks French, English, and Italian; and our international delegate for the Apostleship of Prayer, Fr. Claudio Barriga, who speaks English, French, Spanish, and Italian. I must admit it is not easy having a meeting or even communicating at meals with such a diverse language group. Yet we have many things in common, including a love of the Apostleship of Prayer and a desire to see its renewal and spread. Naturally how this will happen will be different in various parts of the world.
On Tuesday morning we shared our vision of the Apostleship with one another and three members of the Jesuit Curia. It was very consoling to see how inspired these advisors to the General of the Jesuits were as we shared with them the important role we see the Apostleship playing in the world. In the afternoon we talked more among ourselves about how we see that role.
On Wednesday morning we met with Fr. Adolfo Nicolas, the General of the Jesuits and the Director General of the Apostleship of Prayer. His words resonated with us, especially with regard to his desire that the Apostleship be renewed for our times, his encouragement that we help people understand what it means to have a well-grounded Eucharistic spirituality, and his challenge that we develop links with many different groups and people. In the afternoon we met again by ourselves to talk about the essential qualities of the Apostleship of Prayer--that it is Eucharistic, Ecclesial, and for Mission. In other words, the Eucharist and our daily offering of ourselves in which we join ourselves to Jesus' perfect offering of himself on the cross and in the Mass insert us fully into the Church from which we are sent forth to bring God's love into the world. We also discussed how the daily offering prayer is not simply a prayer to be recited but one that has to be lived; in order for that to happen there is need for growth in prayer and the spiritual life. We all need, in the words of Pope John Paul II who loved to quote Jesus' words to Peter (see Luke 5), to go deeper.
Today we continued our discussions about how we would describe the program of the Apostleship of Prayer to people of today and then we moved on to some more concrete and practical matters. We heard a report about the Eucharistic Youth Movement whose mission is to introduce children and young people from 7 to 25 to the way of the Apostleship. We talked about a meeting of the Movement that will happen in Argentina in 2012 and about World Youth Day 2011. Then, in the afternoon, we discussed the 1968 Statutes of the Apostleship and addressed the question of whether they needed revision ("yes") and we asked the question for whom the Apostleship of Prayer was meant and if there were groups on which we should in a special way focus our attention. Obviously, the way of the daily offering is for everyone, but in our times it may be especially important for young people searching for meaning, for sick and elderly people who may see no meaning in their sufferings, for busy people who have little time for long formal prayer, and for seminarians who would find this method helpful for the people they will one day serve.
Tomorrow, I will moderate the discussion and act as secretary, writing the minutes of our day up in the evening, when we return from enjoying a Roman pizza. In the afternoon we meet again with Father General Nicolas. It will be a long and full day.
Wednesday, February 17, 2010
The Rooms of St. Ignatius
On Monday evening I celebrated Mass with the other small group of Jesuits who are here in Rome for a meeting to discuss the Apostleship of Prayer. We celebrated in a little chapel which used to be one of the rooms where St. Ignatius dwelt and where he died. Monday was the feast of St. Claude la Colombiere, who lived a little over a century after St. Ignatius, and it was appropriate that we began our meetings with Mass on his feast and in the rooms of St. Ignatius. St. Claude was the spiritual director of the great Sacred Heart visionary, St. Margaret Mary.
In my homily I spoke about the connections between St. Ignatius, St. Claude, the Sacred Heart of Jesus, and the Apostleship of Prayer. St. Claude, formed by the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius Loyola, had a deep, personal love for Jesus and in particular for his humanity. Jesus loves us with a Heart that is human and divine. Knowing the love of Jesus which is symbolised by his Sacred Heart, St. Claude, following the direction of St. Ignatius, would have listened to what this Heart had to say to him in his prayer and would have responded as one friend speaks to another. He would have had a heart to Heart conversation with Jesus.
But love, as St. Ignatius taught, is expressed in more than words. In fact, it is expressed best in deeds. At the end of the Spiritual Exercises St. Ignatius invites the retreatant to ponder all the good things God has done and to ask, what would a reasonable person do? The answer is to give as one has received. Since we have received everything from God, and since God has held back nothing of himself, then we too ought to make a total offering of ourselves to God. Such an offering is best renewed each day, one day at a time.
And such an offering will ultimately involve sacrifice. It will mean surrendering our own plans, desires, and will to God. This is what happened in the life of St. Ignatius who wanted to be a priest directly serving people in pastoral ways and ended up the last decade of his life as a priest-administrator. Out of love for Jesus, he gave himself to the task of organizing the Jesuit order he founded and writing its Constitutions. He sacrificed his will for the will of God. Love inspired him to do so.
Similarly, St. Claude sacrificed his plans and desires. After serving as St. Margaret Mary's spiritual director he went to England where he was ultimately imprisoned, became ill, and was released lest his death create a political crisis with France. He died a short time later at the early age of 42.
The Daily Offering of the Apostleship of Prayer can only be made as an act of love. If it doesn't arise out of the knowledge of God's deep personal love, it is in danger of becoming a routine or a part of a business negotiation with God. That idea is one of the things we discussed yesterday and today. But more on those discussions another time....
In my homily I spoke about the connections between St. Ignatius, St. Claude, the Sacred Heart of Jesus, and the Apostleship of Prayer. St. Claude, formed by the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius Loyola, had a deep, personal love for Jesus and in particular for his humanity. Jesus loves us with a Heart that is human and divine. Knowing the love of Jesus which is symbolised by his Sacred Heart, St. Claude, following the direction of St. Ignatius, would have listened to what this Heart had to say to him in his prayer and would have responded as one friend speaks to another. He would have had a heart to Heart conversation with Jesus.
But love, as St. Ignatius taught, is expressed in more than words. In fact, it is expressed best in deeds. At the end of the Spiritual Exercises St. Ignatius invites the retreatant to ponder all the good things God has done and to ask, what would a reasonable person do? The answer is to give as one has received. Since we have received everything from God, and since God has held back nothing of himself, then we too ought to make a total offering of ourselves to God. Such an offering is best renewed each day, one day at a time.
And such an offering will ultimately involve sacrifice. It will mean surrendering our own plans, desires, and will to God. This is what happened in the life of St. Ignatius who wanted to be a priest directly serving people in pastoral ways and ended up the last decade of his life as a priest-administrator. Out of love for Jesus, he gave himself to the task of organizing the Jesuit order he founded and writing its Constitutions. He sacrificed his will for the will of God. Love inspired him to do so.
Similarly, St. Claude sacrificed his plans and desires. After serving as St. Margaret Mary's spiritual director he went to England where he was ultimately imprisoned, became ill, and was released lest his death create a political crisis with France. He died a short time later at the early age of 42.
The Daily Offering of the Apostleship of Prayer can only be made as an act of love. If it doesn't arise out of the knowledge of God's deep personal love, it is in danger of becoming a routine or a part of a business negotiation with God. That idea is one of the things we discussed yesterday and today. But more on those discussions another time....
Tuesday, February 16, 2010
St. Peter's Basilica
I'm a day behind in posting, but yesterday morning I went to St. Peter's Basilica. It was an amazing experience. I raced through the church looking for the tomb of Pope John Paul II, the first place that I wanted to visit. I asked a guide who directed me outside the basilica and then downstairs. Many popes are buried there and on my way to Pope John Paul's grave I passed and prayed at Pope Paul VI's grave. After that it was easy to find Pope John Paul's grave because of the people praying in front of it and the guide directing people past it. I was able to stop and pray with the small crowd present there.
Then I made my way to the basilica again and walked all around. Pope Pius XII is buried in the main church, as well as Blessed Pope John XXIII. (I have to admit that I was surprised recently at some letters in the Milwaukee Archdiocesan newspaper which complained about the causes of Pope Pius XII and Pope John Paul II being advanced and Blessed Pope John XXIII being ignored. Obviously the letter writers weren't following their Catholic news very carefully.)
The art and architecture of the main basilica is truly amazing. I took my time walking around, checking out all the large statues to see which saints were given that honor, trying to see around the crowd that gathered in front of Michelangelo's famous "Pieta," and stopping at the foot of the statue of St. Peter to touch his foot and to pray for a special intention that had been entrusted to me.
But I have to admit that the most beautiful site was behind a curtain. I walked past the curtain and the guard who was there and entered the chapel where there is 24 hour Eucharistic Adoration. As I knelt down I thought about all the beautiful things I had just seen and prayed: "But You, Lord, You are the most beautiful of all. I'm grateful to be here at St. Peter's and to see all these wondrous works of art created to give You glory. But in the end, You, here present in the monstrance on the altar, are the most beautiful of all. And I don't even have to leave home to see You. Thank You for Your Eucharistic Presence!"
Then I made my way to the basilica again and walked all around. Pope Pius XII is buried in the main church, as well as Blessed Pope John XXIII. (I have to admit that I was surprised recently at some letters in the Milwaukee Archdiocesan newspaper which complained about the causes of Pope Pius XII and Pope John Paul II being advanced and Blessed Pope John XXIII being ignored. Obviously the letter writers weren't following their Catholic news very carefully.)
The art and architecture of the main basilica is truly amazing. I took my time walking around, checking out all the large statues to see which saints were given that honor, trying to see around the crowd that gathered in front of Michelangelo's famous "Pieta," and stopping at the foot of the statue of St. Peter to touch his foot and to pray for a special intention that had been entrusted to me.
But I have to admit that the most beautiful site was behind a curtain. I walked past the curtain and the guard who was there and entered the chapel where there is 24 hour Eucharistic Adoration. As I knelt down I thought about all the beautiful things I had just seen and prayed: "But You, Lord, You are the most beautiful of all. I'm grateful to be here at St. Peter's and to see all these wondrous works of art created to give You glory. But in the end, You, here present in the monstrance on the altar, are the most beautiful of all. And I don't even have to leave home to see You. Thank You for Your Eucharistic Presence!"
Monday, February 15, 2010
Rome, Day 2
On Sunday I celebrated Mass in Spanish with three other Jesuits in the St. Joseph Chapel of the Jesuit Curia. Then at noon we went to St. Peter's Square for the Holy Father's Sunday Angelus Message. Though the weather was cool, the reception for the Holy Father was warm, especially from the various pilgrim groups who came from Spain, Portugal and Brazil, and other parts of Italy.
I had the great privilege of sharing lunch with Archbishop Raymond Burke, formerly Bishop of LaCrosse and Archbishop of St. Louis and currently Prefect of the Signatura, the Supreme Court of the Church. Archbishop Burke has a deep devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus and is a great supporter of the Apostleship of Prayer. When I arranged for this meeting, he asked me to bring along 20 of our childrens' booklet, "Do You Know the Sacred Heart of Jesus?" On the ceiling of the chapel in his apartments he has three hearts: the Sacred Heart of Jesus, the Immaculate Heart of Mary, and the Purest Heart of Joseph.
After lunch Fr. Jim Grummer and I continued our tour of Rome, visiting 7 churches in three hours, and seeing some of the other famous Roman places like Trevi Fountain. I particularly liked the church of St. Andrew which used to be the chapel for the Jesuit Novitiate and where the body of St. Stanislaus Kostka is buried. In the 16th Century, St. Stanislaus longed to be a Jesuit but his parents opposed his desire and so he walked from Poland to Vienna to Rome in order to enter the Society. He was accepted into the Novitiate but died before taking vows.
We returned to the community for supper followed by a simple social. They say that jet lag usually gets you on the second night and that was the case: I woke up ready for another day at 3 A.M. Many monks rise at that hour to pray and so in my own way I joined them.
I had the great privilege of sharing lunch with Archbishop Raymond Burke, formerly Bishop of LaCrosse and Archbishop of St. Louis and currently Prefect of the Signatura, the Supreme Court of the Church. Archbishop Burke has a deep devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus and is a great supporter of the Apostleship of Prayer. When I arranged for this meeting, he asked me to bring along 20 of our childrens' booklet, "Do You Know the Sacred Heart of Jesus?" On the ceiling of the chapel in his apartments he has three hearts: the Sacred Heart of Jesus, the Immaculate Heart of Mary, and the Purest Heart of Joseph.
After lunch Fr. Jim Grummer and I continued our tour of Rome, visiting 7 churches in three hours, and seeing some of the other famous Roman places like Trevi Fountain. I particularly liked the church of St. Andrew which used to be the chapel for the Jesuit Novitiate and where the body of St. Stanislaus Kostka is buried. In the 16th Century, St. Stanislaus longed to be a Jesuit but his parents opposed his desire and so he walked from Poland to Vienna to Rome in order to enter the Society. He was accepted into the Novitiate but died before taking vows.
We returned to the community for supper followed by a simple social. They say that jet lag usually gets you on the second night and that was the case: I woke up ready for another day at 3 A.M. Many monks rise at that hour to pray and so in my own way I joined them.
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