Thanksgiving Cycle C

Our readings for Sunday are here. 

These are the poems, my notes, and interpretations of Fr Dennis’ homily from the Masses of

  • November 24, 2016 10AM
  • November 25, 2010

_______

The poem Fr Dennis Dillon, SJ references these years are:

In 2016, we reflected on —

  • the origins of Thanksgiving, as captured in The Writers’ Almanac for that same Thanksgiving Day.  He noted the complexities that surround the stories of origin, but asked us to stay tuned to the focus on gratitude of the celebration.
  • He also shared the story from earlier in his Jesuit life, of a parishioner from a parish of limited means, in an urban area.  The only name he received from her and others was “Bottle Mary.”  She had had tuberculosis and spent 14 years or so in a sanitarium, of which 3 to 4 years she was restricted to bed.  She would chat with all, cheerily.  Someone with no reason to be kind or good-natured, yet she was.  He had one photo with her … hulking over her at his 6’2″ or so, and she was small (in part due to so many years of poor health).
  • She is one of the people of his life that he turns to as a model of gratefulness, and encourages us to find those individuals in our own lives.
  • the E. E. Cummings poem encourages us to move outside our box, our comfort zones … and the last lines of seeing and hearing seem especially fitting to our gospel of healing today.

In 2010, we reflected that —

  • Our gratitude and joy often arise in the broader context of challenges.  Our personalities and quirks, our defining characteristics seem to come more from these experiences that challenge us.  Wendell Berry’s poem, The Sycamore, captures this sense beautifully.
  • At this Mass, Fr Dennis drew us close to the altar — about 100 of us gathered to the center of the church, near and with him.  We always held hands for the Our Father at our parish, but this was something much closer when we did so.  The Last Supper, a table of close friends, seemed closer … and thus Christ.  Then, just when we thought we were bound in … how do we manage communion like this … among 100?  Out he comes from the altar moves far enough down the center aisle, and the two queues form and flow, gradually unwinding from the altar & sanctuary and weaving into straight lines t to him for the Sacrament, and then head down the empty rows to return to their seats for the post-Communion reflection moment.
  • In that Mass, I began to understand how a Good Shepherd creatively holds the flock close to the Sacrament and to himself (without ever getting between the Creator and God’s Created) in a Christian love.  The Mass became a work of art in the hands of a creative spirit, rather than a dry checklist unimaginatively completed. The mystery of our faith was easy to feel in that Thanksgiving of thin space.

Today’s image is one of the bark of a sycamore, attributed to the web name of Dragana Gordic. I liked the complexity and simplicity, richness of color within a narrow range of palette.

Thirty-Fourth and Final Sunday of Ordinary Time,

The Solemnity of Christ the King Cycle C

Our readings for Sunday are here. 

These are the poem, my notes, and interpretations of Fr Dennis’ homily from the Masses of

  • November 24, 2019
  • November 20, 2016 5PM
  • November 24, 2013 8:30AM

_______

The songs Fr Dennis Dillon, SJ references these years are:

In 2019 notes, we reflected that —

  • The end time themes, like the traditional When the Stars Begin to Fall, embed new hopes (“what a morning”) with the endings.  This is what we know from Christ’s life and death; it all brings newness and salvation.  There are no promises about the Way, just that it is the Way to and with Love Loving.

In 2013, we reflected that —

  • The Solemnity of Our Lord Jesus Christ, King of the Universe, is an observance originated in the 1920s by the Church as a statement against the totalitarianism of Russia, Germany, and Spain, which were persecuting and murdering those who weren’t syncophants to the state.  No personal dignity or sacredness.
  • With Christ as King, each of us has dignity.
  • The United States can feel different, but we had sanctioned and institutionalized slavery (no personal dignity or sacredness) which has simply changed form in our culture over the centuries; it has not been eradicated.  Racism remains a great weight.  Yet Christ was a huge call to Africans for freedom from exile, from slavery (Moses), for the Good News, for Christ’s Kingdom, and thus they could not be kept down in spirit because of Christ the King. Or perhaps more accurately, Black spirituality and abiding faith in Jesus raised up in dignity and love and forgiveness those who believe.
  • D2 played one of Jessye Norman’s versions of “Give Me Jesus.” 
  • The simplicity but power of the message, particularly arising out of the African-American … or any marginalized or oppressed people’s experience.  Jesus is enough.
  • The featured image is the original art, “Glimpses from the New Creation,” created by W David O Taylor.

Thirty-Third Sunday of Ordinary Time, Cycle C


Apologies to readers for the clumsy indenting and formatting. A bunch of technical updates at once and user limitations of skill and patience! 🙂

Our readings for Sunday are here. 

These are the poems, my notes, and interpretations of Fr Dennis’ homily from the Masses of


• November 13, 2016 10AM
• November 10, 2013

The poems Fr Dennis references these years are:


• 2016 homily — Slowly, Slowly, They Return by Wendell Berry
• 2013 homily — A Song on the End of the World by Czeslaw Milosz (transl. Anthony Milosz)
• 2013 homily — A Left-Handed Commencement Address (Mills College, 1983) by Ursula K Leguin

In 2016, we reflected that —


• it is a somewhat rare experience that we have these scriptures and all have shared a national (general) election (this past Tuesday, November 8, 2016).
• D2 encourages us to undertake an imaginative prayer with the last line of Malachi: … … There will arise // the sun of justice with its healing rays.
• Imagine the healing rays of the sun as well.
• The poem by Wendell Berry is kind of like a psalm of praise and the “tier after tier” of pine branches are structured like choir risers, upholding the “weightless grace” of birds.
• For rl, the poem and the fourth stanza, beginning “Receiving sun and giving shade // Their life’s a benefaction made, …” reminds me of the end scene of ORDINARY PEOPLE, in which the father (Donald Sutherland) and son (Timothy Hutton) receive sun and give shade to each other, in much needed love.

In 2013, we reflected that —


• rl did not write down her notes but only the poems!
• The poems wonderfully capture the insistence of today’s readings that sticking close with God in this world is neither easy nor bereft of joy because it is a path of vulnerability, counter to the ways of the world. The Way is difficult in all manners, and we will be tested and confronted for the sake of that relationship with God.
• The act of hope, the prayer, in the song “on the end of the world” in the final stanza of Milosz’ poem of the same name. A year or so later from this homily, Russia annexed the territory of Crimea from Ukraine, 70 years after Milosz wrote this poem in Warsaw, 1944. And now, not quite 10 years later Ukraine fights for its democracy and sovereignty again.
• Ursula K LeGuin’s “Left-Handed Commencement Address” is more direct, being in prose and directed to a specific audience, a group of young graduates, exhorting them to live in the paradigm of life rather than power.

Thirty-Second Sunday of Ordinary Time, Cycle C

Our readings for Sunday are here. 

These are the poem, my notes, and interpretations of Fr Dennis’ homily from the Mass of

  • November 10, 2013 9PM

_______

The poem Fr Dennis references this year is:

In 2013, we reflected that —

  • At the time of the Maccabees , the Jewish people began to believe in resurrection (~200 to 100 B.C.E.). But, of course, humans being human — not all Jewish people did:
    • the Pharisees became the branch of Judaism that did believe in the Resurrection, and so this is the tradition Jesus was a part of.
    • the Sadduccees did not believe in the Resurrection and stuck tight to the first 5 books (the Pentateuch), which is why they begin their conversation with Jesus with “Teacher, Moses wrote for us …”
  • The Jewish people were not unique in this regard.  The Greeks of the time continued to press an engraved coin under the corpse’s tongue (only one side of the coin was engraved — cheaper production cost that way!) to pay the ferryman Charon for passage across the River Styx.  This is just one cultural example, among many, indicating how the Spirit or soul lies beyond corporeal death.
  • This sense of disintegration, flying away in spirit, and re-configuring in hope of new life is captured in Mary Oliver’s “Starlings in Winter.”  It reminds us of our hope in the life in the Resurrection.
  • This action of the starlings is called murmuration.

Thirty-First Sunday of Ordinary Time, Cycle C

Our readings for Sunday are here. 

These are the poems, my notes, and interpretations of Fr Dennis’ homilies from the Masses of

  • October 30, 2016 8:30AM
  • November 3, 2013

_______

The poems Fr Dennis Dillon, SJ references this year are:

  • 2016 homily — Fall by Edward Hirsch
  • 2013 homily — Harmony by Stuart Kestenbaum

We also remember that, in phrases of our time, Jericho was considered a “den of iniquity.” So, one abridged telling, as Fr Dennis points out below about our God, “Lover of Souls,” is that this amazing God loves each of us, anywhere, anytime. And that is a reassuring thought.

In 2016, we reflected on —

  • D2 visualizes scene with short, scurrying Zaccheus (Zuh-KEE-us) played by Danny DeVito.
  • D2 had thought it might have been an original notion, but then one of the websites he uses (Left Behind and Loving It) also mentioned it, and then more.  He found it reassuring that others thought the same thing.
  • Blog Point 1: it’s unclear in the original Greek whether he climbs the tree because Jesus is short or Zaccheus is short.  Changes the reading a bit … and our sympathies some, too.  Reassuring to know Jesus might have been short.
  • Blog Point 2:  the tense of his compensation is in the present tense, as in “I am [currently] giving four-fold” rather than the future tense, “I will pay four-fold.”  The former is a mark of enthusiasm rather than conversion, the latter of which is often how the passage is read.  (rl note — this is also discussed in the New Jerome Biblical Commentary.)
  • Zaccheus comes down from the tree right away, another mark of this enthusaism.  And, from the blog, Jesus calls him by name … by nickname!!  “Zacchi” rather than “Zaccheus.”
  • So … we love a personal God, who loves us.  This took D2 (or at least rl’s recollection of where it took his homily!!) to the phrase from the Wisdom reading “lover of souls.”  Loving us as we are.  Zaccheus’ story fits with this.
  • D2 chose a poem by Edward Hirsch about autumn starting with “Fall, falling, fallen.” 
  • It reminds me (rl) of being on my bicycle in autumn going down our beautiful wooded roads in the Michigan autumn.  The scene is available for everyone, but it feels like it’s right there, just for me, because I’m with God — using the eyes, heart, senses, legs, lungs, and bicycle God gave me the money to buy, … all of it — to share it back with God.
    • And, I leave the experience feeling beloved and loving in return with an open heart, filled with gratitude quietly overpouring, which seems how we ought to feel after Eucharist, too.
    • D2 celebrates a great Eucharistic Rite, too.  Bottomline is that it feels like he loves us (or at least loves being with us), and rightly or wrongly, it then is easier to imagine Christ wanting to be close to us.

In 2013, we reflected that —

  • If it was a film, he’d have Danny DeVito play the role of Zaccheus — self-important tax collector, short, wealthy, but wanting to have different experiences.
  • So!  In D2’s Ignatian Contemplation of the scene:
    • It was quite a sight to see a wealthy man up a tree!
    • When a person in the gospel is called by name, it usually means the person became a Christian (as the gospels were mostly written for Christians
  • Zaccheus’ story is traditionally thought of as one of coming to faith
    • Seems like he climbed the tree out of sheer curiosity (rl — maybe the same kind of attitude that King Herod in JC SUPERSTAR had — just wanted to see a miracle).
    • Jesus calls him out of the tree so Jesus can be a guest and, of course, people complain in one translation “stood there” but it can also be translated as “stood his ground.”
    • Zaccheus knew his scriptures and has not turned his back on them.
      • The penalty for fraud was 2x the valued restitution.
      • The penalty for thievery was 4x the restitution.
      • Zaccheus has been paying the more serious restitution as an act of faith and repentance.  (See 2016 notes discussing that this was declaration of what he was already doing not a pledge of behavior to come.)
  • D2 thought this story is a reminder that the oddest circumstances lead us to God, natural curiosity to God’s grandeur, and how God intervenes and gives meaning.
  • Noted that a musing on how John’s gospel would have told this story would have Jesus intending to go to Jericho to find Zaccheus;  Lucan Jesus happens to need to go to Jericho and Zaccheus happens to be the soul he finds and saves.
  • Kestenbaum’s poem of Harmony captures this Lucan vision of salvation.

Happy Halloween!

Just sharing a bit of the beauty of Midwest autumn in the United States, replayed throughout the Great Lakes region and more. The grandeur of God in the trees and their colors, the joys of Halloween decorating for the little goblin & ghostie in all of us, the backyard brawl fun of the University of Michigan v Michigan State University annual (American) football game for the Paul Bunyan trophy.

Mass (2021)

Our secon film of this year’s 2022 series, Fractured Fairy Tales, at St Mary’s is MASS, a Fran Kanz film. The AADL has both a regular single disc DVD and Blu-Ray edition. We watched the former.

We had a few more people but were still able to discuss in a circle (no microphone needed!) our thoughts on the film. Generally, the attendees thought it very engaging, particularly as we are watching two sets of parents talking and listening to each other in a single room for the majority of the film. We discussed both the emotional movement and cinematic techniques to make the setting seem larger than it was.

Without jumping in too far in description here … let’s see what people have to say about it and use the comments for discussion.

Thirtieth Sunday of Ordinary Time, Cycle C

Our readings for Sunday are here. 

These are the poems, my notes, and interpretations of Fr Dennis’ homilies from the Masses of

  • October 23, 2016 5PM
  • October 27, 2013 8:30AM

_______

The poems Fr Dennis references this year are:

From the New Jerome Biblical Commentary, indicates the gospel was directed to the disciples.

In 2016, we reflected on —

  • D2 started with a joke:  A priest offers a prayer of Thanksgiving after Mass, after everyone had left.  He realizes how much in debt he was and prostrates in front of the Tabernacle, “O Lord, be merciful to me a sinner.”  The deacon passes by and does the same.  Neither had noticed a custodian, and he did the same.  The priest looks at the deacon and says, “Look who thinks he’s a sinner.”
  •  ==> We all like to see ourselves and the gospel in a comfortable way.  We all have a tendency to think of ourselves as superior.  :-}  Sometimes we’re wrong.  It comes about when we place our own opinions above others.
  • In the first reading,
    • God is hearing those who are helpless, who can’t do anything right.  They are the people God helps.  God preferentially helps or is proximate to the poor, the widow, and the oppressed because they need it, not because God is “unduly partial.”
    • Dorothy Day is one of the great saints in D2’s life.  When he was at NYU, she attended their Jesuit parish.  She didn’t think of herself as the holy norm.  “Don’t call me a saint!”  Instead, pursue holiness as vigorously as she did. 
    • We’re all called on a special path made for each of us, which will help Christ build the Kin-dom.
  • So, we all make mistakes in
    • looking down on people (e.g., the Pharisee in the gospel story, and D2’s other Dorothy Day story, “Did you wish to speak with one of us?”), AND
    • looking up at people (hero worship and idols, rather than mutuality or God-focus)
  • How we are each called and how often we miss that call.  In past and present, poetry and its means to call out a moral lesson:
    • There is so much bad in the best of us.
    • There is so much good in the worst of us.
    • That it ill behooves to talk about the rest of us.
  • Eavan Boland poem —
    • how often we can miss what is beautiful each day
    • we can follow Jesus with strength and hope for our community, having food (the Eucharist) and strength to follow that call

 In 2013, we reflected that —

  • Hearing the cry of the poor
    • the poor, the widow, and the oppressed in the first reading from Sirach
    • Paul as the poor and need in prison
    • in the Gospel, how do we care for all those in need?  We ask for God’s help.
  • The focus in today’s readings are that the exalted shall be humbled; the humbled shall be exalted.
    • This scenario is shared often and recurrent in the gospels; so it is very central to Jesus’ message.  It is a simple story … just not easy.
    • One translation has the Pharisee saying “like this tax collector” as a direct reference to the humble tax collector in the story.  Other translations use “the tax collector” as a generic disparaging comparison.  In a brief cameo, Fr Tom Florek, SJ noted how Pope Francis, in one of his interviews, self-referenced as “I am a sinner.”
  • It’s all a good reminder that we can’t become humble enough; there’s no room for complacency in this practice.
  • The E. E. Cummings poem can be read as one describing a life / lives without genuine relationship, a life without humbleness, humility, or spiritual practice
    • “furnished” indicates non-personalized, chosen for them and/or accepted by default
    • Protestants were “protesters” at the onset of their religion, but now? … bland, no personal spiritual beauty

Twenty-Ninth Sunday of Ordinary Time, Cycle C

Our readings for Sunday are here. 

These are the poems, my notes, and interpretations of Fr Dennis’ homilies from the Masses of

  • October 16, 2016 10AM
  • October 20, 2013 8:30AM

_______

The poems Fr Dennis references this year are:

In 2016, we reflected on —

  • In the first reading, Moses as intercessor for Israel’s survival and triumph
    • Moses needed help and God did respond, and it resulted in real action.  Moses went to the mountain top, closest to God (as God was seen as heaven above).
    • His staff is raised, almost reminding us of a human lightning rod through which God’s action will pass, and image that he is conducting God’s power to Earth.
    • Moses gets tired
      • he needs to sit, so they bring him a rock (now his knees are bent)
      • his arms grow tired, so Aaron & Hur hold up his arms
      • Moses has gradually taken on the posture of the Crucifixion, foreshadowing Jesus’ crucifixion.  Jesus as the new Moses (think of the Transfiguration).
      • This is a clear powerful image that all of us need help.
  • In the second reading, from Paul to Timothy
    • rl’s notes are far more colloquial than Fr Dennis would have said, but the gist is: s’okay if some of the older folks disagree with you, you gots da Spirit ==> so carry on and preach the gospel “in season and out”
  • In the Gospel (Luke 18:1-8),
    • It was normal for judges to have their palms greased
    • The widow has no money at all, let alone for palm-greasing, so she has to convince a judge, who “neither feared God nor respected any human being,” on the merits for a “just judgment”
    • He gives her a righteous/just judgment … but he is still an unjust judge!  🙂
    • God will save us so much more quickly than the judge.  There are different aspects of truth.
    • In the final line, “When the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?” D2 can imagine a somewhat discouraged Jesus.
    • Faith is/as a personal response, sometimes it feels like “Is this worth it?”
  • In Berry’s poem VII, he writes how the smallest works allow God to return in us, be pleased, and rest.
  • In Adcock’s poem, kindness is a vital part of our lives and to survival.

In 2013, we reflected that —

  • The decisive question in the Sunday readings is not whether God will vindicate his persecuted community (after/during his absence); the real question is whether Jesus’ disciples will remain faithful in his long absence — “will he find faith on earth?”, i.e., will they persist in prayer?
  • Parables are never simple allegories, e.g., we are the widow, so & so is the dishonest judge.  Parables are supposed to be complex and multi-layered, open to multiple viewings.  🙂  That’s why it’s called the Living Word.  🙂
  • This persistence in prayer — what is it?
    • staying with it, even in the dry spells; repetition or habit
    • rootedness in the earth and reaching for the stars & heaven (traditionally, going to the mountain is symbolic for meeting God or being close to God)
  • In the first reading, Moses
    • goes to the mountain to do his part — pray! –with Aaron and Hur
    • raises his arms with the staff of God (which handily doubles as a walking stick), and he gets tired
    • but Aaron & Hur, like our church community helps us to pray by helping make each other and the body whole, help Moses persist in prayer
    • our friends can help us persist in prayer like Aaron & Hur, holding up Moses’ arms in wide-open supplication … like Jesus on the cross, the ultimate intercessor
  • In Great Trees by Wendell Berry, we hear of rooted earth ready for life, creating life of leaves from earth, air, light, and water — so we can receive light and share it with others.

Twenty-Eighth Sunday of Ordinary Time, Cycle C

Our readings for Sunday are here. 

These are the poems, my notes, and interpretations of Fr Dennis’ homilies from the Masses of

  • October 13, 2019 8:30AM
  • October 9, 2016 Noon

_______

The poem Fr Dennis references is:

  • Kindness by Stephen Dunn
  • no poem in 2016 as there was a baptism

In 2019, we reflected on —

  • the poem, Kindness by Stephen Dunn.  While I’m sure we reflected on more with Fr Dennis, I did not take notes at this homily!

 In 2016, we reflected that —

  • the baptism is a homily, in a way  🙂
    • we are celebrating another member of the church
    • faith is active in our lives, and how we share it
  • there are no special readings for baptisms, because Sunday readings are always about faith. But these two readings (Naaman from 2 Kings and the grateful Samaritan healed of leprosy) are especially good with
    • a main character being an outsider, an alien or foreigner
    • the Israeli King thinks his request is a ruse
    • Naaman / Elisha — Naaman thinks the request/ritual is a farce and beneath him
    • His servants encourage him to get in the Jordan River, and he receives the “flesh of a young child,”  … seems like more than curing of the skin disease, more like a baptism with its fresh start.
  • Dennis, at his age (76+ at the time) sees and enjoys the contrast between his hands and all their marks of wear, tear, and age with the unblemished newness of the baby’s skin in a Baptism.
  • For outsiders, holy people aren’t from Israel (everyone has their own gods, holy people, prophets, and soil), but Naaman wants to give a gift to Elisha for this service.
    • Elisha turns it over to God;
    • so Naaman asks for two loads of Jewish soil, which will be enough to worship the God of Israel on, indicating that he is a kind of convert to Judaism.
  • The gospel story from Luke is also a conversion story.  This time by a Samaritan healed of leprosy, the only one of ten people suffering from leprosy (Hansen’s disease) to return in gratitude.  The ten people suffering from leprosy leave, are healed as they go, and the outsider (the Samaritan) returns to Jesus to give thanks.  Jesus has given them what they need next, a large sense of life’s many gifts to us, which hopefully invokes gratitude in us.
    • Jesus ends that his “faith has saved him” so this is not solely a cure, nor solely religious.
    • Anything that gives life is part of God’s salvation
    • Anything that allows us to see life is part of God’s salvation
    • All blessings and healings are part of God’s salvation