The Surest Sign

Our readings for Sunday are here. 

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

• August 21, 2016 10AM Mass

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The poem Fr Dennis references this year is:

• Singapore by Mary Oliver

In 2016, we reflected on —

• Somehow, the readings seem appropriate with the start of the school year and the theme of “discipline,” as our summer season of adventures winds down.
• D2 reminded us that each Cycle (A – Mark, B – Matthew, or C – Luke) is based primarily on one gospel (and the Gospel of John is used during Triduum and to fill in on other liturgical seasons).  The gospel passage is chosen for an appropriate liturgical theme (e.g., the summery Eastertide readings are an unlikely match as Lenten readings).  Once the gospel passage for a Sunday is selected, the first reading (generally Hebrew Scriptures) is chosen to match it; and then the 2nd reading (generally a progression through one of the epistles).  As a result, the 2nd reading may or may not match the gospel & first reading.
• First reading, Isaiah — the prophecy is God’s glory going out to all nations.  As the Jewish community spread out across the globe/lands; God is going to be active there, too; and they will come from East and West to Jerusalem (not just Jews) … as equals to Jews … and some will be called / taken as priests and Levites.  What?!?!?  At the time, this was an unfathomable notion, as the Jews (and Jews alone) were God’s chosen people.
• All world religions face this challenge:  How can God be my God .. and everybody’s God?  It’s human nature, we each need to establish God’s Love for me, and then we are more open to God loving everyone else, too.  In the Consecration, the 2011 text changed from “My blood will be poured out for you and everyone” to “blood poured out for you and for many.”  “Many” in Hebrew means “everyone” as ancient languages often counted “1, 2, many.”
• Jesus is someone his disciples (then and us now) must hold in the mystery of being a remarkable personal friend and savior of the world.
• Our poem this Sunday is Mary Oliver’s Singapore.  D2 prepped us that he would physically be moving from one place in front of the sanctuary to another (say, four feet away) and back to model the structure of the written poem, in which the new experience she is having is on the left side of the page and her experience of nature & poetry to that point on the right side of the page.  Her final stanza is in the middle, her new center after this epiphany. (Alas, the online link rl found does not match the formatting of the 1990 House of Light version reprinted in New and Selected Poems, Vol. 1. that Fr Dennis found and used.)
• “A darkness was ripped from my eyes” — Mary Oliver’s is a paraphrase of God being not just for me but for everyone.  Her poem clearly states how she doesn’t like the idea of this woman’s work, of a life compelling this sort of work, or the lack of nature’s beauty in this setting (and thus, this poem she is writing).
• But the woman’s smile convinces her that light can be in such a job, a light that can shine out of such a life … with the result that the poem is filled with trees and birds .. they are just in a new form.
• God is not a matter of head knowledge but in experience of all forms of our God and my God.

There was a good Charlie Brown & Snoopy image with friend and savior text … and probably all kinds of copyright violations, even by fair use standards. So, I went with the Salvadoran Good Shepherd crucifix …  🙂

Our readings for Sunday are here. 

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

• August 18, 2019 Noon Mass
• August 18, 2013 Noon Mass

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The poems Fr Dennis references in these years are:

• 2019 homily — Questionnaire by Wendell Berry and Almanac by Lois Parker Edstrom
• 2013 homily — For a Dying Tomcat Who’s Relinquished His Former Hissing and Predatory Nature by Mary Karr; paintings of the face of Jesus and The Burning of the Houses of Lords and Commons, 16 October 1834 by Joseph Mallord William Turner (British, 1775-1851) at the Cleveland Art Museum

In 2019, we reflected on the juxtaposition of great desire and great suffering in the gospel passage.  We likely reflected on much more, but I have not the notes!  🙂  Sorry!

In 2013, we reflected on

• St Ignatius used “hearts on fire” and “set the world on fire” to describe the charism of the Jesuits. 
• (rl notes the Jesuit sense of humor, as Fr James Martin, S.J. in his book The Jesuit Guide to (Almost) Everything, pointed out that in the Jesuit Curiae in Rome, a statue of St Ignatius with the slogan of “Set the world on fire” on its pedestal is located right next to the fire extinguisher.)
• D2 continued — Our readings capture some of the deep desires of our faith, desires that help lead us on and through severe challenges:
  • In the 1st Reading, Jeremiah is subject to much suffering and trials
  • In the 2nd Reading, St Paul exhorts that Jesus endures the cross in obedience for the joy to come (not causal, but in faith)
  • In the gospel reading from Luke, “set against” could also be translated as “set apart” in Greek.  We’re unsure.  But Christ’s great desire to bring us to the Kin-dom, even though he had to pass through great suffering and death is our model of longing and desire for God’s Will, God’s Love.
• In the Cleveland Art Museum, there is a face of Jesus displaying … actually, there are lots of faces of Jesus in the Cleveland Art Museum!  So, rl found this one … In the Very Disk of the Sun Shines the Face of Jesus Christ, 1888.  But, I am wondering if this homily is one of the times that Fr Dennis mentioned St Peter Repentant (the blog image), one that shows Peter looking up to Christ in the Judgment Hall after his third denial of knowing him and meeting Mercy.  It looks like a face that has met and is meeting love and the realization that we are always already forgiven.
• Also, the painting of The Burning of the Houses of Lords and Commons, 16 October 1834 captures how people are drawn to / compelled to gather around fire.
• In the poem For a Dying Tomcat,
  • Our offerings to Christ at the peak of our inner fire (the neighbor’s koi). Our offerings to Christ as our means to act in return to Christ’s offerings begins to fade until we begin …
  • Learning to rest in Christ’s arms (like a reverse pieta), as the fire now seeks to still me.
• Christ separating us from earthly family / communities to return us to God the family.

So … the Feast of the Transfiguration is … a Feast.  It is a biggie for the message it shares, however, liturgically — it is not a Holy Day of Obligation.  But it is pretty amazing!  So, since it was one of my favorite Fr Dennis homilies when it fell on a Thursday in 2014 (Cycle A), here we go / rachamuid!  His homily, shortened for daily mass sensibilities and kind consideration of the flock’s schedule, works for Cycle C.  

Our readings for Transfiguration are here. 

This is the link to the dance, my notes, and interpretations of Fr Dennis Dillon SJ’s homily from the

• Thursday, August 6, 2014 5:10 Daily Mass

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The art Fr Dennis references is:

• Alvin Ailey’s Revelations, a dance suite now considered a quintessential American dance choreography, created by Alvin Ailey. 

In 2014, we reflected on —

• That August 6 is the anniversary date of the Hiroshima bombing by United States Air Forces in 1945. 
• (rl notes, to be clear, Fr Dennis was not saying nuclear detonations are emblematic of the Transfiguration!  As one of the generation growing up during WWII and devoted to life, he found it important to remember the anniversary of one of the two days human settlements were subject to nuclear attack on that scale. A very complex time of history — best not to judge but to stay in the vulnerable heart of its complexity.)
• (but … back to Transfiguration!)
• Transfiguration contains readings, and the gospel most particularly, of resplendence.
• We might imagine this moment of Transfiguration akin to the Irish engagement with “thin spaces” in which the resplendent world abides closely with ours.  D2 imagine-prayed that the Transfiguration (Peter, John, and James abiding with Jesus transfigured, Moses and Elijah) might feel like a thin space to Peter, John, and James.
• In his life, a rare personal interlude in a homily, he recounted that when he was missioned to NYC for his PhD in Film History and Criticism at NYU, he did his best to experience the city.  He and others from his Jesuit community would serve at the same Catholic Worker House that Dorothy Day served.  (He recounts one encounter in a different homily.)  But also, they would engage with the arts — the hallmark of NYC.
• He had an experience of being so Beloved, so transfigured after watching a performance of Alvin Ailey’s Revelations for the first time, that he wanted to walk rather than take the enclosed limiting subway home.  So he near bounced up the stairs out of the subway to street level.  It felt like he was walking 1/2 foot off the ground the whole way home, feeling like — yes! he could move like the dancers moved!  Of course, as he noted — he wasn’t moving like the dancers and couldn’t, but that sense of possibility arising out of our Belovedness is the gift given to us by God through Jesus and lived in the Spirit.
• When I (rl) heard his homily and watched youtube, I was infected with the Transfiguration, too!  The next day my old legs and I dashed out on my bicycle and found myself laughing joyously as I pedaled a furious pace to slowly grind “full speed” up one of Ann Arbor’s steep hills.  It came when I walked into the Heathdale, the closest thing to a sacred grove in Ann Arbor, and was surrounded by butterflies.  It was present when my high school friends and I overlooked the night lights of “Spaceport Billings” a là STAR WARS and pledged what we were going to do.  But that chatter was immediately outshone by turning to the night sky filled with the shining backbone of the Milky Way and sharing who we are.  We are Beloved. 
• Thanks, D2.

Apologies for the Featured Image quality … but that’s what Transfiguration, a deep moment of Belovedness felt like for me … based on how resonant Fr Dennis’ description of Transfiguration moments feel.

Leaf Quidditch by Lorraine Lamey

The chlorophyll has left the leaves.
A zephyr sets the branches waving farewell
to their bright or brown denizens.
The road ahead drops just right
for the tilted pitch of a Seeker’s two-wheeler.
My bicycle and I take flight coasting downhill
at a hearty speed and with precarious leanings
but not so precarious as in years past.
We sail among the drifting leaves dancing
like sunbeams in and out of my outstretched fingers.

I am transfigured with each ascension
though my pace and joints evoke the rickety-clickety clack
of an early wooden rollercoaster
hauling a full load to its peak height.
The ten minute ascent garners scarcely a two minute ride.
Push off, pedal a bit, brakes ready for the all-stop intersection,
clear?
Then pedal furiously to make up for caution.
During each descent, the leaves and wind stream by
and slough off another decade from my heart and soul.
Weight, worry, and weariness whip behind me.
By the fourth ascent, I am ten-years-old again
and playing leaf quidditch on my bicycle.
In that moment of refulgent joy,
a wee brightest yellow sugar maple leaf
finds me.

Our readings for Sunday are here.  In 2016, Fr Dennis discussed St Ignatius of Loyola, as a Jesuit parish, we may observe his Memorial.

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

• July 31, 2016 8:30AM, and
• August 4, 2013

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The poems Fr Dennis references in these years are:

• 2016 homily — First Things First by W.H. Auden
• 2013 homily — NYTimes Magazine article on “Ignatius of Loyola: The Saintly Boss”

In 2016, we reflected on —

• In the readings, Deuteronomy is death and doom; Corinthians is about the glory of God; and the Gospel of John selection is “Come and see!”
• D2 referred back to a late 1990s NYTimes Magazine that had a series on the Me Millenium (us).
• From 0 to 1000 CE humans built large organizations and communities, 1000-2000 CE became much more about individual identity, particularly in western civilizations.
• This NYTimes May series explored archetypal personalities, e.g., Heloise, Faust, Jane Austen, and also … Ignatius of Loyola: The Saintly Boss.
• He was an admirable leader who regularly danced for the younger Jesuits.
• He was a saintly boss for his flexibility, concern for inner and outer lives of organizational members, and his heartfelt connection with people from all walks of life. (rl notes St Ignatius was one of the first religious leaders to acknowledge that women did not engage in prostitution for moral reasons but for economic reasons, and act and serve from that faith foundation.)
• As a leader he embraced diversity, teaching, and the Spiritual Exercises (based on the insight that God is present in our imaginations.
• He gave up the incredible joy of celebrating Mass when it began to interfere with his ability to respond and be in communion with the Eucharist. 
• (rl took this as when our emotions of an activity undermine the very purpose of the activity, e.g., I might get so excited about toasty flannel sheets and a down comforter on a cold, snowing night, the giddiness of it all made sleep impossible.  St Ignatius’ tears and emotions took him out of the prayer space a priest needs to celebrate Mass; perhaps too much of a good thing.)

In 2013, we reflected on —

• Fr Dennis read Fr General Arturo Sosa S.J.’s Letter to the Jesuits — humble in tone, as we would hope, and grateful for Pope Francis celebrating a humble yet engaged Eucharist, in the mystery of the Sacrament at the Jesuit mothership, Gesu Church in downtown Rome.  Pope Francis then offered a votive candle to St Ignatius; prayed at the altar of Saint Francis Xavier across the way.  He ended with visiting the remains of Father General Pedro Arrupe, S.J.  In essence, he prayed his way through the history of the Society of Jesus since its founding.
• D2 ended with W.H. Auden’s First Things First poem.  A poem about being grateful for what we have and abiding in that gratitude.
• He also included a David Brooks op-ed column on THE SEARCHERS, a John Ford 1956 film which we had watched in the St Mary’s Summer Film series of that year (created and shepherded by guess who! That’s right — D2!)  The gist was that the film captured one generation’s story “about men who are caught on the wrong side of a historical transition” and used that as context for 1/5 of 25 to 54-year-old men are out of the work force (compared to 4% around 50 years ago). 
• rl notes that Mr. Brooks engaged with the impact of gender and race on these numbers in passing, if at all.  Still, a thoughtful piece of writing.

In the summers of 2017 and 2018 I took a class through Loyola University Chicago Institute of Pastoral Studies that had an intensive field study portion in Rome and environs for about ten days.  Both times I spent much of my free time with the masses and side chapels in the Church of Gesù, as well as the rooms of St Ignatius.  With the former, which also included a side chapel for Oscar Romero, including the Missal he was using when he was martyred, you feel and see the lived experience of the Jesuits through history attempting to walk with Jesus.  The regular display in the apse is the circumcision of Jesus, that “bloodletting” would have satisfied the sacrificial requirement … however, it is the Passion in which he shows how greatly God loves and humbles God’s self to witness Love.  Hence, a large statue of the Sacred Heart of Jesus is presented in the apse (replacing the circumcision).   While most of us will not be called to that sort of sacrifice and even fewer to answer it, we can all turn to the Sacred Heart to live more fully in God’s Love.  And that is the Ad Majorem Dei Gloriam the Society of Jesus kinship is formed of and to.

Our image today is a mural in El Paisnal, El Salvador, seen in this Jan. 29 photo by Rhina Guidos, that features Blessed Oscar Romero and town native Fr. Rutilio Grande, S.J. surrounded by rural men, women and children, the community the Jesuit Father Grande served from 1972 until his March 12, 1977, assassination. Fr. Grande spoke of his dream of a communal table where everyone, including the poor, had a place to eat and a right to have a say in matters that affected them. Catholic News Service photo by Rhina Guidos.

Our readings for Sunday are here. 

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

• July 28, 2019 Mass

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The poem Fr Dennis references in this year is:

• 2019 homily — Pied Beauty by Gerard Manley Hopkins, on his 175th birthday

In 2019, we reflected simply on —

• God’s goodness
• God’s gifts
• and God’s good gifts

which D2 thought expressed particularly well in Gerard Manley Hopkins, SJ’s poem, Pied Beauty on this the 175th birthday of GMH!

For those who may be unfamiliar with GMH, he was a Jesuit priest, a convert to Catholicism.  In this case, wiki pegs our attraction to his poetry:

His prosody – notably his concept of sprung rhythm – established him as an innovator, as did his praise of God through vivid use of imagery and nature.

The Poetry Foundation‘s description is really thorough.

And Natalie Merchant captures the mystery and enchantment of his Spring and Fall poem by setting it to music, in her album of children’s music.

This blog is brief, but the readings and the poem capture it all. 

In today’s (Monday’s) excerpt from Psalm 50, “[You who] offers praise as a sacrifice glorifies me; …”  Indeed, how absolutely wonderful, isn’t it?!? —

we can serve God with praise; praise of all that God gives, all that makes us alive, keeps us alive, and resurrects.  Whatta God!  🙂

Playing fox kits seems ample praise today!

Our readings for Sunday are here. 

These are the book referral, my notes, and interpretations of Fr Dennis’ homily from

• July 21, 2013

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The book Fr Dennis references in 2013 (rather than a poem):

• 2013 homily — Martha Manning’s Undercurrents
• rl found Mary Oliver’s Why I Wake Early and Freshen the Flower, She Said a good fit

This must have been one of my early or lighter note-taking Sundays, perhaps one of my first.

In 2013, we reflected on such wonderful readings and good insights.  Thanks, D2!  —

• In the first reading,
  • Abraham and Sarah are hosting a trio of Angels, some think the Trinity.  (A quick biblical note, “the Trinity” is not mentioned in the Christian or Hebrew Scriptures; the Trinity is a theological understanding of God that developed over time and from the scriptures — including this one and the multiple “Trinitarian formulations” in Christian scripture, e.g., invocations of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.)
  • In Gen 18:1, “the Lord appeared to Abraham” and in Gen 18:2, “… Abraham saw three men standing nearby” and then addresses them as the singular “Sir” in 18:3.
  • But the emphasis of the first reading (and the other two) is hospitality and invitation.  Abraham portrays the urgency of presence and welcome, in accordance with custom of the time and echoed later in Christian scripture with “Do not neglect hospitality to strangers, for by this some have entertained angels without knowing it.” (Heb 13:2).

• In the gospel of Luke,
  • The story also emphasizes hospitality and prayer, with presence being the key to either ministry or engagement.  The acts of hospitality and the motions of prayer do not fulfill hospitality and prayer without our heartfelt or mindful presence in these efforts.
  • Martha is “anxious and worried about many things” (Lk 10:41), while Mary is present with Jesus in breaking open the scripture.
  • Mary could have been worried about violating social norms of women and religion, but she remained present to Love.  Martha could have been present to hospitality as Abraham was, who served his guests, and then “waited on them under the tree while they ate” (Gen 18:8).
• In Martha Manning’s book, Undercurrents: A Life Beneath the Surface, Fr Dennis thought that Martha Manning’s book captured the sense of balance for each of us in our inner Martha and Mary.
  • This is the memoir of an ordinary woman—a mother, a daughter, a psychologist, a wife—who tells the tale of her spiraling descent into a severe, debilitating depression. Undercurrents pioneers a new literature about women and depression that offers a vision of action instead of victimhood, hope instead of despair.
  • We need faith that nothing is “taken away” when we rest, that is part of the contemplative nature of the Kin-dom.

For myself (rl), in light of Abraham’s and Sarah’s challenges in Jewish culture of the day from wandering, being landless for so long, and childless — I found the enthusiasm of Abraham in offering hospitality captured in Mary Oliver’s poem Why I Wake Early, when she writes a poem of gratitude and ends, “Watch now, how I start the day in happiness, in kindness.”  These choices not only bless and uphold wandering angels, they bless and uphold us.

Similarly, for the gospel, the invitation to and teaching of presence by Jesus, was captured in Mary Oliver’s Freshen the Flowers, She Said, in which she ends a poem about being present to fluffing cut flowers in a vase with “… Fifteen minutes of music // with nothing playing.”  

Andrei Rublev’s Trinity is the image of this post, though I was sorely tempted to find another image of daisies to share. Ann Arbor is hosting its annual Art Fairs (3 large fairs for 3 days), and one of the artists had a beautiful, super high resolution of a firefly sitting on a daisy bloom and back-lighting one of its petals. Extraordinary.

Our readings for Sunday are here. 

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

• July 10, 2016 5PM Mass
• July 14, 2013

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The poems Fr Dennis references in these years are:

• 2016 homily — Still, I Give Thanks by Marie Reynolds
• 2013 homily — a Dorothy Day quote attributed to a 1964 Catholic Worker

In 2016, we reflected on such wonderful readings and good insights.  Thanks, D2!  🙂 —

• In the first reading,
  • Moses is letting the people know that these are not obscure sets of law; they are close and within in us and in our hearts.  The early lines (Dt 30:10) state the law as the Will of God, and the remainder (Dt 30:11-14) capture the mystical, personal relationship with God.
  • rl is reminded of Jeremiah’s prophecy from God in J 31:33, that the Love of God will be written in our hearts and Saint Gregory of Nazianzus’ Oration 14 Love of the Poor (~370 C.E., in which he exhorts that we are made in the image of God (Imago Dei) when we love human beings, preferentially the poor).
  • All this returns to D2’s point:  We know what to do, God has placed it there inside us.  It’s the doing that is before us.
• In the second reading of Colossians,
  • It reads almost like a hymn to Jesus.  He is both the inspiration for the Creation, and he sums it all up.
  • But the apostles and disciples know him as a human being — the humanity behind the divinity of which this “hymn” sings.
  • So few words are used compared to the impact of them.
• In the gospel of Luke,
  • How we interpret the parable of the Good Samaritan how it has grown from its early interpretations, instead
    • Jesus = Good Samaritan
    • Adam = wounded/sick man, victim of the devil himself
  • In this understanding, then, the priest (law) and the Levite (prophets) pass by because only Jesus is compassion AND human’s death and resurrection.
  • In the parable, wine and oil are used to heal the wounded traveler, like Jesus comes to us in the wine and oil of the sacraments.
  • It all hinges on Mercy, “neighbor” is the one who shows Mercy.  We receive it and give it because we have been saved.  We do so (we mercify, or however you make “mercy” a verb!) out of gratitude, but also only because of having received the grace of Mercy from God.
  • In the text, the scholar of the law correctly captures that we need both love of God one-on-one and love in community (that’s why we pray the “Our Father,” not the “my Father”).
  • The parable makes one thing clear about God’s Mercy, the mercy that we are to live and are graced with:  exclude no one.
• The poem by Marie Reynolds is
  • set in the context of her cancer treatments,
  • focuses on joy as the insatiable appetite for life and gratitude (“Thanks for my feet, my fingers, …”), hopes (“I want to see my mother again,” “I want my doctor to use the word ‘cure’ just once”), for others (“for the hands that position me, their measurements and marking pens”)
  • Early in the poem she gives “thanks for the scrub jay’s audacious cries …” and at the end she “close[s] my eyes and think[s] of the jay.”

• Fr Dennis found
  • Jesus (“J” “jay”) in the lines “We wear the same raiment: blood, bone, muscle.”  This is akin to how Jesus shares our blood, bone, and muscle.
  • And this invisible bird — “invisible feathers, invisible wings” that give “a quickening, felt deep within the body, vigorous and fleeting” offer how in our soul, the sense of hope, wanting to live is the Spirit abiding in us.
• Fr Eric Sundrup, SJ in the 10AM Mass gets a cameo with one of his insights from the parable that walking to help is (often) walking into danger, and we are to “go and do likewise.” <gulp>  However, when we do so out of the gratitude for the gifts we’ve received and the grace of mercy, we are made “safe” from the inside by the Eucharist.  In other words, we can be in consolation that we are in the right place at the right time, regardless of earthly outcome.

In 2013, we reflected on —

• The readings offer the wonderful tension between God’s Will, as manifested in the law, and the mystical personal relationship, as manifested in the person of Jesus Christ.
• Fr Dennis offered a Dorothy Day poem/note/quote indicating how grateful she was to know Jesus in prayer and in the poor.  Please take it as the art of Fr Dennis’ homilies that this was seamless in oration, and now clunky being resurrected in my deficient notes!  But Dorothy Day attended daily mass and had her own repeated presences in prayer with Jesus throughout the day.  The point being the same as made in the first reading — God and God’s Will, Love, and Mercy are not “out there,” they are in “here” (she wrote gesturing to her heart).
• He then suggested Ignatian contemplation of the Good Samaritan parable, becoming alive in the scene and invoking your senses to see what God might have stand out for you at this time and place in your life.  (rl thinks that’s one of the great beauties of Ignatian contemplation:  God can reach you through scripture and connect it with your daily life, but do so uniquely across the experiences and days of your life without changing the words of the scripture passage you read.)

I chose a simple image of the Good Samaritan parable by James Tissot.  Most of his originals are tiny!  But the detail and sense of richness is large. He only used settings and human models of the region of scripture.

Our readings for Sunday are here. 

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

• July 4, 2016 8:30 Mass
• July 7, 2013

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The poems Fr Dennis references in these years are:

• 2016 homily — To the Student Who Asked Why He Earned a “C” on an Essay about Love by Clint Margrave
• 2013 homily — The Lilies by Wendell Berry

In 2016, we reflected on —

• In the first reading,
  • Rejoice!  Rejoice! The first reading and the gospel are of joy.
  • They are nice readings to have during summer with its green and verdancy, vivid reminders to rejoice because our names are written in heaven.
• In the Gospel of Luke, the author is the only one to mention the 72 disciples.  This number doesn’t come up often, and we don’t know who they are.  It’s possible they represent a literary parallel to Moses’ 72, to create the sense of Jesus as the new Moses, to assure the Jews that Jesus is in the line of prophets. See 2013 note on same topic, below.
• In the poem, Margrave captures how to live love, a Christian love that always falls short, is always active, and always growing.  How love is lived rather than romanticized.
• Also in the stumblings Margrave captures, we are called to keep reaching for the crazy love of Christ with and to each other.  Anything less?  We’re settling.
• This poem was shared shortly after I had finally submitted my application for Pastoral Studies program at Loyola Chicago — and that’s what it felt like.  How could I ever explain to myself, let alone to admissions, why I wanted to continue.  Words never describe how God touches, creates, and recreates our lives.  But we can try, and live in the gratitude of the experience of being Beloved and trying to Love.
• A brief Fr Eric Sundrup, SJ cameo — a reminder that the circumcision / no circumcision was a hot topic in its day, and the “no circumcision” point of view would have been received like bashing the United States on the Fourth of July, but the point of the readings is don’t settle, keep reaching for the glory of the cross —

In 2013, we reflected on —

• In last week’s reading, Jesus seemingly set the bar pretty high — leave everything and everyone, etc… but even so …
• This week, with that standard 70 disciples went out!  (It’s unclear in the original text whether it is 70 or 72 disciples), but in the Hebrew Scriptures Moses receives 70 helpers (Genesis 10), and there were 70 nations in the world at that time
• Wendell Berry writes so pointedly about the strange search for rest and faith and peace in his poem The Lilies.  D2 offered
  • Isaiah and the Psalms are treasures of the heart, like lilies.
  • Letting the peace of Christ control our hearts in the seeking and not seeking; in the finding and not finding, particularly Isaiah, Psalms, Galatians, and Gospel of Luke.

No special message with the Van Gogh, other than that it is summer. We have much to be grateful for, even amidst all the work of the Kin-dom before us. 🙂

Our readings for the Sunday of this blog are here. 

The ones used for this Sunday, June 29, 2025, with the observance of the Solemnity of Sts Peter and Paul, Apostles, are these ones.

And at least one of our Jesuit reads the “Feed my sheep” passage from John 21:1-19. So. I am making an editorial choice this year to keep it simple and continue to share the notes of the Thirteenth Sunday and Fr Dennis’ homily from prior years. His Third Sunday of Easter (Good Shepherd Sunday Cycle X) has some, as usual, thoughtful insights into the passage from John.

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

• June 30, 2013

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The poems Fr Dennis references in these years are:

• 2013 homily — At North Farm by John Ashbery

In 2013, we reflected on —

• In the first reading of the standard Cycle C,
  • the mantle is a sign of a successor — in this case, Elisha being the successor of Elijah the prophet.
  • Elijah is being kind of cranky with God in the context of this vignette.
  • Elisha is responding in an all out “Yes!” and making sure he can’t turn back by breaking the plow and burning it.
• In the Gospel, when Jesus refers to the looking back while using one of the light plows of the time, he is likely alluding that looking back while using the plows of his day would likely create a crooked furrow.
• In D2’s and our youth, his mom (and likely our parents) often rolled out platitudes such as “anything worth doing is worth doing well.”  In his case, because often he was lazy and could do reasonably well without much effort, and now being older, and for whatever reason for each of us — we simply cannot do everything well … but there are still some things worth doing, even if we must do so poorly.
• Another maxim, fitting to Elisha, is nothing succeeds like success (or excess)!  There is the success and excess of this world; and the excess that is the just right response to the overflowingness of Christ’s call and God’s Love that fits in our freedom of choice; i.e., it is no slavery on part. 
• But our response is often mixed, tinged with regret and constraint in letting go, like the varied examples in today’s gospel reading.
• “At North Farm” evokes the “and yet” quality that captures our desire to
  • to match God’s excess toward us and “do well.”  This something, this relationship with God is very much worth doing well.
  • and yet not letting that desire interfere with the reality of our limitations and still do this meaningful something, even when we must do so “poorly.”  Because, through Christ’s unrestrained and obedient offering of excess, we are “all in” by way of the Eucharist.

So … I’m not sure I have a good fox image handy for the “Foxes have dens” quote. But I found one with a fox outside its den! I hadn’t thought about this with the passage of foxes having dens and birds having nests; but, both have dens and nests only when they are incubating or raising their young. The kits are inside the den for one or two months while the dog and vixen hunt for food and protect them, and then foxes sleep outside. The same goes for birds. I’m not sure where reflection will lead with the idea that Jesus has nowhere to rest his head, in this context.