Dear Friends,
You should have recently received a reminder letter in the mail from the Archdiocese concerning the Archdiocesan Annual Appeal. Our parish is about half way to the goal given to us. I am sure we will be able to make our goal if all of us contribute toward it. Having been a member of the Finance Council for the Archdiocese for the last ten years, I know how important the campaign is for the work that the Archdiocese is doing. With the immense efforts underway to provide a plan to guide the parishes in the Archdiocese into the future with fewer priests, the Annual Appeal is more important than ever. Please consider a gift to the Annual Appeal. If you happened to toss the reminder in the trash with the other third class mail you receive, there are envelopes for the Annual Appeal near the doorways at the church.
Somehow, we have come to the end of Ordinary Time. Today is the last Sunday in Ordinary Time and next Sunday we celebrate Christ the King and then Advent begins. It seems like it was just Pentecost. How can Christmas be just a few weeks away? Older people always told me that time goes fast when you grow old. Now that I have grown old, I really want to slow time down.
I can take a bit of comfort from a Christian philosophical understanding of sacred things. Sacred things do not “happen” like common things happen. Sacred things are always happening. Sacred things do not come and go. We come and go, but sacred things are. This is because of the nature of God. While time is flying by for me, God is not bound by time. Within a Christian theology of the sacred, Christ was crucified once, but that single, historical instance of crucifixion is the same crucifixion which is celebrated whenever the Eucharist is celebrated. Within the infinite being of God, all things are present. In this sense, the Crucifixion is always present before God, but so is the Resurrection and the Annunciation. God is not subject to hours and days and years like we are. When we say “Jesus is risen” on Easter, we mean “Jesus is risen today” and not “Jesus was risen and is (still) risen.” We say “Jesus is risen” because the present is being drawn up into the timeless. The same with Christmas, when we greet one another, it is fitting to say, “Christ is born!” and not “Christ was born!” When we come into the presence of God, we are not merely coming to a place, but a time, and time works differently in heaven than on earth. At least, I know that time will not continue to speed up when I get to heaven. All of us in eternity will share in the timeless wonder where God has always dwelt.
The Gospel on this last Sunday in Ordinary Time reminds us of the end of all time and how we Christians should be until that day arrives. What Jesus predicts seems scary, but those who know history may say, well those kinds of things have always been happening. Right. Such scripture passages as Revelations and today’s Gospel are not so much about what is to come, but of what is now the case.
Every generation, in some way, is the last. And each generation, like each death happening every day, witnesses the signs of the end times. Everything that Christ predicted has taken place and is taking place and will continue to take place. Our deepest trust and faith then should not be on the things of this world, but in the God who loves us and the God who gave his life for us.
Yes, time moves fast, but God is the one who holds all time and holds all of us.
Peace,
Fr. Damian