Team Prayer Service: Unique While One in Christ

From time to time, the delights of my job as campus minister give me the platform to speak to the school or groups of students. Here is the talk (followed by the readings I chose) I gave at the weekly football team prayer service, the first part of the team's preparations between the end of the school day and their Friday night games.

The past few years, the NBA has become increasingly dominated by “super-teams.” People forget, but the Celtics were the ones who really started it when they traded for Kevin Garnett and Ray Allen to join Paul Pierce, and they won a championship. Miami followed suit and has won two championships, and teams like the Lakers, Nets, and Knicks have tried to copy the super-team approach without much success. 

Two years ago, as NFL training camps geared up, the Eagles signed free agent QB Vince Young to backup the oft-injured Michael Vick. Earlier that offseason, the Eagles had made some big splashes. They signed top free agents CB Nnamdi Ashomugha and DE Jason Babin to expensive contracts. They shipped out Kevin Kolb for cover-corner Dominique Rodgers-Cromartie and a high draft pick. And then they added Young as a high-profile backup to their flashy starting QB. 

When the Eagles introduced Young at a press conference, he was asked about the impressive roster the Eagles had assembled for the 2011 season. Without hesitation, he told them, “Dream team,” and added, “It's beautiful to see where we're trying to go.” 

Young's line would be replayed over and over that year as the Eagles started the season 4-8 and never really threatened for playoff contention. Young had evaluated his team based on how famous its players were, how much money people were getting paid, and how much attention they had gotten in the media. When he uttered that infamous line, he hadn't even stepped on the field yet with this “dream team.” And when he did, he must have quickly realized that no matter how good the team looked on paper, none of that mattered when they couldn't back it up on the field. 

What's a real Dream Team? Quick history lesson: the 1992 USA Men's Basketball Team. The real Dream Team. The original Dream Team. 11 of its 12 members are in the Basketball Hall of Fame. Early in their olympic preparations, during a scrimmage against a team made up of college players, Coach Chuck Daly intentionally made dumb substitutions and poor coaching decisions. Coach Daly knew the team would lose and intended for them to get frustrated and motivated. It worked. As the 1992 Olympics, they went undefeated as a team, winning on average by 45 points. The best players of that era – many of them among the greatest of all time – understood that they were part of one of the greatest teams ever and adjusted their styles to form an unstoppable team and absolutely dominate the international competition. 

What stops groups from getting there? Why couldn't Kobe, Nash, Gasol, and Howard dominate last year? Why don't the Yankees win the World Series year-in and year-out? Why did the Eagles' “dream team” fizzle out? 

Teams have to realize the importance of their identity. Dwight Howard didn't buy into being a part of Kobe's Laker dynasty. The Yankees' players probably get complacent once they've gotten big money contracts. The Eagles big acquisitions didn't come together as a team. 

For you guys, you have to consider to yourselves – Who am I on this team? 

What do I mean to my teammates on the field?... What's your position? What are your assignments for each formation? What's your responsibility for each play? 

What do I mean to my teammates off the field?... Who needs my support? What players can I help by reviewing positioning and technique? What players can I go to with questions about my own game? What teammates will pick me up when I'm down? Who can I fire up? 

I'm a baseball player, and I've been a baseball coach. I never played high school football, but I can tell you about high school baseball players. Most of the guys head to the field, walk to the on deck circle, or take the pitcher's mound with their stats firmly in mind. 

Guys can tell you how many errors they've made, or not made. Hitters have a running tally of their RBI and a live number for their batting average. Pitchers could tell you their ERA on an inning-by-inning basis. Baseball players get obsessed with their stats, and it becomes really easy to become distracted from the team, and the most important stat – the W column. Guys become more worried about their batting average and ERA than the outcome of the game. 

When I was a starting pitcher, I was the same way. When a hitter made contact, as I'd watch the play and move to cover my responsibility, I'd judge whether or not it was an error or hit and recalculate my ERA and stats as I walked back to the mound. Some games, I'd be more focused on getting outs and keeping us in the game. Other games, my mental attention to my own stat sheet only made the outcome worse for me and my team. 

It was an epidemic for us. Most guys knew their own stats as well as the stats of their teammates and could readily produce arguments on why they should be pitching or in the starting lineup rather than that guy who's out there, including my teammate, Mike. 

One of our players was named Dante. He was the QB from our football team. He had never really played much baseball, but he still made the baseball team without attending tryouts; coach used him as a pitcher and a right-fielder. Mike was next to me on the bench while Dante started that game, and Mike didn't like when Dante played or pitched instead of him. In the middle of the game, Dante came up with the bases loaded, after already driving in a couple runs earlier in the game. This at-bat, he got a pitch on the outer half of the plate and hit it to the opposite field, out toward the scoreboard and up into the wind blowing out to right field. The ball carried over the wall for a grand slam and kept us in the game when we were trailing big. I couldn't believe how well Dante was hitting that day. Neither could Mike. Earlier in the game he had made his case against Dante playing, and now as Dante rounded the bases, Mike quietly said to me, “Even a blind squirrel finds a nut once in a while.” 

Rather than be happy for our team and for our teammate, Mike was obsessively fixated on his individual stuff. Even if Dante's spot on our team wasn't earned, even if he got special treatment, he was still a teammate. He was still playing hard. He was still helping our team try to win. 

In two years, my baseball teams won 13 games. We lost 47. Forty-seven. We laughed under our breath when our coach yelled at us. We were slow and lazy getting ready for games. We buried a message in a bottle in the dugout sand as we blew a 10-run lead and got slaughtered by mercy rule. 

We knew how to make each other laugh and have a good time, but we had no idea what it meant to be a team, to focus on a goal together. We knew our own stats, but I doubt many guys knew our record. We looked out for ourselves and knew what we produced when we got playing time, but we never worked toward becoming a team and forging an identity. 

Jesus asks his disciples what people are saying about Him. People are still figuring Jesus out. They know He is wise and holy and loving, but they're not sure what His deal is. Is he a reincarnation of Elijah or Jeremiah? Is he a new prophet from God? Is he like John the Baptist? 

Jesus asks Peter what he thinks personally, and Peter hits it out of the park. Peter goes out on a limb and admits that he knows that Jesus is the Son of God. Almost like a game show announcer telling a contestant what he's won, Jesus embraces Peter with support and love. 

Jesus is so proud of Peter that he makes him the leader of the group. Jesus tells Peter that He'll support whatever Peter does to guide believers, and this is where we get the tradition of a pope. The pope is meant to follow this call that Jesus gives to Peter to unite and guide Christ's people all over the world. Peter's conversation with Jesus is one of things that gives our “team”, our Christian community, its identity. Peter's profound faith in Christ leads Jesus to make him our leader, someone around whom we can unite as we try to follow Christ. 

In the first reading, Paul told us that even with our unique qualities, we are part of one group together. For people in Paul's time, it didn't matter if they were Jewish or Greek people. It didn't matter if they were free-men or slaves. They were one in Jesus Christ. Their belief in Him, their baptism into His life, death, and resurrection united them. 

For us today, the same idea continues. We know Christ is the Son of God. Regardless of whether we live in Illinois or Indiana, regardless of whether we come from white, black, Latino or any other heritage, regardless of being freshmen or seniors, we at Bishop Noll know we are one together in Christ. 

Jesus pats Peter on the back because he knew it and was not afraid to say it. Peter's faithful commitment to Christ helps solidify Peter's identity. When we recognize that God made us and loves us, that he sent Jesus and the Holy Spirit to show us His love, we too find our identity. No matter if we're male or female, black or white, rich or poor, young or old, we are all united in Christ. 

So think about this team: What sets you apart? What makes you unique? What do you bring to the table that is special to just you? 

For your team – How can you contribute that to an identity that's bigger than just yourself? How do you share yourself in a way that helps others and makes the group better? 

It all is built on Christ. As we try to learn what makes us unique as individuals, as we try to learn how we can contribute ourselves to the team, we can start from our unity in Christ. And as Bishop Noll students, as members of the Warriors football team, we must build everything on that reality. We are all one in Christ.

__________

Readings

First Reading

A reading from the letter of St. Paul to the Galatians:

For through faith you are all children of God in Christ Jesus.
For all of you who were baptized into Christ
have clothed yourselves with Christ.
There is neither Jew nor Greek,
there is neither slave nor free person,
there is not male and female;
for you are all one in Christ Jesus.
And if you belong to Christ,
then you are Abraham’s descendant,
heirs according to the promise.

Gospel

A reading from the Holy Gospel according to Matthew:

[Jesus] asked his disciples,

"Who do people say that the Son of Man is?"

They replied, "Some say John the Baptist,

others Elijah, still others Jeremiah or one of the prophets."

He said to them, 

"But who do you say that I am?" 

Simon Peter said in reply, 

"You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God." 

Jesus said to him, 

"Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah. 

For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, 

but my heavenly Father.

And so I say to you,

you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church,

and the gates of the netherworld shall not prevail against it.

I will give you the keys to the kingdom of heaven.”

Relationship or Public Relations?

I just can't seem to resolve the internal tensions I'm feeling in the midst of this heated-up battle for the smart-phone market share.

Nokia is trying to take a bite out of it with ads that emphasize the power of their "reinvented zoom" on the smart phone camera that enables you take amazing pictures. No problem there. But it's the way they pitch it.

Much like Apple's pedestal-ization of the power of the iPhone's camera, iTunes, and FaceTime features, this new ad centers on a moment at a concert during which a girl takes a photo of the stage, uses the new zoom and crop to create a really sharp image of the performer, and quickly shares it with friends. We then see a montage of her friends' guffaw over what they think are her awesome seats.

Things that are ok: taking pictures at concert, sharing your experience with friends, being jealous of or impressed by or excited for friends' exploits.

Things that are dangerous: staring at your phone rather than the world around you, especially in the midst of a special experience like a live concert; having to share such experiences or know about others' immediately; needing to provoke a reaction via texts or social media.

I stopped the fast forward on a DVR-watch to review this commercial when it came up, wanting to hear my girlfriend's reaction as compared to mine, to see if my interpretation was ridiculous.

We started by expressing frustration at the girl's tunnel-vision, looking down into the funnel of light emanating from her backlit screen amid the hullabaloo of a concert.

Then we thought about how just being at the concert, and being there with a friend, was insufficient. The photo had to be shared - in this case, her friends also craved immediacy in pulling their phones out immediately and expressing mostly disbelief and jealousy.

We finished wondering - building off this growing impulse we feel to be documentarians of all things we experience - if because of the ease of doing video, photo, FaceTime, check-ins or status updates, we cannot resist providing a constantly refreshed stream of self-identification to the world. And if we cannot resist having tight control and immediate broadcast ability.

We as humans have always felt anxious about how others perceive us. In the past, we turned mainly to physical trappings. We might alter the way we dress, the way we talk, the expressions we use, the places we go to hang out, our hairstyle, etc. Now, the plethora of social media accounts out there provide a huge opportunity for people to control the flow of information about themselves and supply people with a very particular image.

Instagram provides your life in photos. Twitter broadcasts the stream of consciousness. Snapchat and Vine send around the mundane or sudden ideas. Foursquare and other "check-in" apps let people know where you've been and where you are. Pinterest shares your creativity. Tumblr, Blogger, Wordpress and others give you an online forum. Facebook does most all these things and more.

Everyone can basically become their own PR-firm, crafting the spread of information and updates about their exploits day-by-day, hour-by-hour, minute-by-minute.

This can be a blessing and a curse. All technology can be used for good or bad. It's up to us to decide what to do with the power in the palms of our hands.

Sometimes, technology enables us to communicate with others more than we ever could before. It becomes a supplemental way for us to bridge the gap between encounters in the traditional ways (face-to-face conversation, nights out, etc). We get into trouble when the technology becomes the primary way we communicate with others (there are times when distance and/or time make it more necessary to resort to this) and takes a big bite out of traditional encounters. Worse, we really dehumanize ourselves when our mode of interaction and expression becomes solely electronic.

We become shadows of ourselves when we rely on a technological tapestry of our activity to define ourselves and show others who we are. Posts to social media can provide fodder to our friends that allow them to stay better plugged into the happenings of our lives. Checking in on friends online can be a great starting point to the next conversation you get to have with a person. The danger comes when our desire to keep tabs on a friend's life devolves into the only way we stay appraised of their lives.

This might be ok for old acquaintances from school or friends you might only care to see once in a blue moon. However, if our primary relationships - with parents, siblings, and best friends - evolve into this mode, the nourishment we need, the love that our being calls us to can give and receive back in kind, gets diluted. We go thirsty and find great difficulty finding legitimate sustenance through solely or heavily electronic relationship.

Let me offer myself as a case study, and cast the first stone at myself.

Pros? I turned off those little red numbers on my phone that tell me how many notifications I have in my Gmail or Facebook, and they also can no longer pop up in my lock screen. The camera in the iPhone is great, and it allows me snap pictures even if I forget or choose not to bring my point-and-shoot digital camera; plus, it syncs automatically to my laptop and is nifty for stuff at work and boosting my social media accounts there. Relatedly, I'm building a Twitter and Facebook following to try to get campus ministry and faith into the news-feed streams of teenagers and redeem some of the chatter that saturates those worlds. Finally, my dad loves picture messaging, especially about places we'd like to go as a family but can't necessarily all get to at the same time - sporting events, dinners out, visits to friends.

Cons? Texting and emailing is easier than ever, and my balance between just calling and/or visiting friends or co-workers in person can be tenuous. An in-person conversation can be so much more immediate and conclusive than the up-in-the-air-ness of email that I lean on too heavily. I, too, shoot photos and videos at sporting events and concerts. I try to limit myself to a select few pictures or a short video or two, but temptation can be strong. I think I did ok lucking into on-the-field seats at Notre Dame last weekend, and I only hope the memory is ingrained strongly from that one-of-a-kind experience. Most obsessively, I love the geo-tagging on Facebook. I love to post statuses or pictures on location and add locations to photos I post in batches. I meticulously went back in time and geo-tagged my photos on Facebook because I loved the map feature on my timeline and how it illustrated all the places I've been. It's definitely a guilty pleasure, and I know I've used it to brag.

What do you think? How do your social media and wireless capabilities affect your desire to create or control perception of you? Are you just telling it like it is and simply providing a link for people into your life? Are you very consciously and editorially choosing particular things to tailor an image? Are you complementing relationships through your usage or replacing interpersonal encounters with technological activity?

Even if you think your usage isn't troublesome, what about your intentions or motivations? Why are you checking in with a status and tagging the location? Why are you taking an Instagram of that sunset? Why are you checking your mail or refreshing your newsfeed?

At the end of the day, is the way that each of us use the technology at our fingertips oriented toward relationship or our own public image and perception? Is it emphasizing or belittling our humanity? Is it enhancing or diluting our human relationships?

Call to Worship: Lie in the Grass

From time to time, the delights of my job as campus minister give me the platform to speak to the school or groups of students. Here is the my Call to Worship to open our start of the year Mass, adapted from thoughts originally found in a previous blog on a homily I heard:

Good morning! Welcome to our Opening of the Year Mass, the first of many times when we will gather around this table to realize our unity in Christ. Right now we're on the brink of another school year. Looking ahead to nine months of classes, homework, tests, essays, and projects can seem daunting – and not just to you students, but also to the staff, administrators, and your teachers, too.

Let me tell you three simple facts.

1. Grass grows.
2. No one has ever seen grass grow.
3. If you laid down in a field for a long time, the growth would envelop you.
--Repeat--

Students, you might not want to go to class at all. You might not want to jump back into the deep end of schoolwork. You might already be getting tired of getting up early, working the whole day, and then going to after-school practices. You might feel like all these rules and prayers are cramping your style. You might feel like you don't have time to worry about God or what you believe in right now.

Teachers, you might already be dragging in lesson-planning or grading. You might be dreading that next test you have to write, then give, then grade, and then record to the gradebook. Staff and administration, you may already be drowning in a crowded inbox of emails or feeling overwhelmed by a filled-up voicemail box.

Let me tell you three simple facts.

1. Grass grows.
2. No one has ever seen grass grow.
3. If you laid down in a field for a long time, the growth would envelop you.

We may get tired, stressed, or frustrated as we dig into the new year. But we need to embrace patience. Patience that our routines will become comfortable and familiar. Patience that we can meet our deadlines and get our work done. Patience that we will learn each other's names, get to know each other, and make new friends. Patience that our GPA's can improve with hard work and focus. Patience that our God who made us and loves us is in fact with us always, already at work in our lives before we even wake up in the morning.

Our patience and dedication grows when we support each other. Bishop Noll is known as a family. The family that prays together, stays together. We come together to pray many times a day, and none is more important than our prayer around the Eucharist. Jesus comes to be with us and offers Himself to us. Let's come together to receive Him. And today when your Eucharistic Minister looks you in the eye and says, “The Body of Christ,” know that your Amen isn't just in response to a mysteriously bless-ed piece of bread. For we too are the Body of Christ, walking, breathing, living, and loving one another.

We can help each other's patience by our love and community. Let's start now, with this Mass, and commit to this family.

Grass grows. Great things have happened, are happening, and will continue to happen here. It's hard to see each bit of growth, but if you stick with it, the grass will envelop you.

A Submission on Submission

This post is my attempt to join in the discussion catalyzed by Rachel Held Evans' Let's Talk about Submission week. Visit http://rachelheldevans.com/ to join in the conversation and consider perspectives on mutual submission to another in response to the messages from the Epistles.

Here's my thoughts...

Submission conjures up some interesting images.

I think of writers busting their keyboards up with last minute copy as they scramble to sharpen a story ahead of a deadline.

I think of ultimate-fighters and wrestlers contorting their opponents' bodies into excruciating shapes until they tap out.

I think of Loki - in The Avengers - telling humanity that it only wants freedom from freedom, that absolute obedience to a higher source of authority is the true realization of freedom.

And the punster in me thinks of a submarine boat sent out on campaign in war - get it? sub mission?

The principle at play is some kind of yielding. Whether to a deadline or physical force, submission involves some level of deference, of letting go.

The idea of submission being mutual, then, is counter-intuitive. A writer couldn't submit their article mutually; a mixed martial-arts fighter couldn't get an opponent to tap out mutually; a villain couldn't demand mutual submission.

Mutual is not a natural modifier for the word submission, so how can the two be considered together? St. Paul's teachings come in the light of the Gospel of Christ, so submission gains a significant context.

Love.

In Christ, love is care for oneself and others that both gives and receives.

Sometimes, love can be exaggerated as love that must totally abandon all self-concern. However, we must love ourselves in order to truly share ourselves, following the example of Christ who allowed his hosts to treat him with hospitality, who allowed a woman to anoint his feet.

As usual, Christ manifests mysterious paradoxes to us and for us. We must let go of life in order to gain it. We must let go of ourselves in order to find ourselves. We must be served as well as serve.

In Christ, submission embodies the mutuality of true love. Christ, who is God, is love.

The greatest way to find love is to take the initiative in loving. When we give of ourselves selflessly and without condition, we open our hearts to mutuality. Others respond by filling us up with their love in kind. Such generosity and self-gift points the way to true relationship, to a two-way street of giving and receiving in which we can reflect our God, the Trinity who is Lover (Father), Beloved (Son), and the love shared between (Holy Spirit).

Mutual submission becomes possible when we meet one another on the common ground of unconditionality - care, attention, help, support, and compassion that is oriented toward emptying of self and filling up of another. In this way, the bonds we know through the mystical Body of Christ, like conduits running between each person and all their brothers and sisters, run feverishly with love.

Love enables us to give of ourselves while being filled up in kind. Sometimes, we can give more than others; other times, we may run close to empty and be in need of a big fill-up.

The Lord provides through our relationships, for His Holy Spirit - the love shared between us - dwells with us always.

Put it Down and Look Around

In the past few days, the links that appear in my feeds and inboxes all lead me to commentary on the saturation of technology and internet in daily life.

The Samsung Galaxy has been carpet-bombing us with propaganda to get us off our propaganda-driven Apple loyalties.

Rachel Held Evans tries to explain how we are in danger of becoming little more than the sum of our social media posts.

Then, my brother turns me on to an America article that argues pretty well that Apple is dangerously similar to religion, and even more damning than that, a dead-on commentary about the crooked angle Apple's newest commercials have taken.

That last article suggests that we're gonna look back on these Apple ads in particular as an example of how distracted we've gotten from what's important: "Apple’s consecrating the behavior [of staring on a screen], and even going on to say that their products, not the lives they serve, are 'what matters.'"

Let me back up a step or two. I am an Apple user, since buying my MacBook and iPod before starting college. And when my phone came up for upgrade earlier this year, dissatisfied with the messaging phone options from AT&T, I took the iPhone plunge, too, selling my iTouch so as not to limits the device depths into which I would wade.

The key to smart phones and mobile devices is moderation. Just like with sexual urges, drugs and alcohol, eating, and so many other things, the object, the action, at stake isn't bad, but our excessive (or sometimes overly minimal) use of it can lead us down a bad road.

Maps apps help us navigate and learn our way. Uber gets us a cab on the double. Yelp helps us find a good bite to eat. Laudate even gives Catholics all the goods on readings, prayers, and much more. The instant gratification is seriously dangerous, but moderate use gives us accessibility and the chance to do things we couldn't do before, or at least with greater ease and frequency.

The point of that last article I linked is that our usage of these devices - for example in these Apple commercials, for listening to music or taking photos and videos - can distract us from the presence of the moment. The mobile devices put great power into our hands, and it's not wrong for us to want to use it. It is troubling when our desire becomes fixation or addiction or compulsion. We're not so much choosing to do things on the device as we are simply just doing it.

The new Windows Phone commercials advertise its "reinvented zoom", a great new feature for those of us who have increasingly left our digital cameras in the drawer and opted to use our smart phone cameras more. But again, the challenge is to pick the times and places to bust it out rather than going on autopilot.

Anyone who's been to a concert or sporting event can attest to the proliferation of phones. I feel like people weren't this compulsory about photos and video before smart phones. We see spectacular photos and videos in the news, online, or in magazines, and we think there's no reason we can't join in. Even if we aren't as accomplished or artistically refined, we can become photographers and cameramen, but to what end?

Sometimes, we have a compulsion to take a photo or shoot a video, or sometimes we feel that we need a photo or video. Rather than experience that quintessential song live and absorb every ounce of the one-time moment, we watch through a screen of inches, trying to steady our hands and focus on our framing. Sure, we have a copy of the real deal to keep forever, but how does this impact the quality and longevity of that memory?

I worry about compulsion more than anything. At Mumford & Sons in the summer, I limited myself to two 30-second videos. On my email-linked apps, I turned off the little red numbers so that my compulsive phone-checking couldn't be entrenched by the satisfaction of having new e-mail. In notification center, I turned off alerts for everything except calls, texts, and calendar. I'm still wrestling with the phone-checking habit, a habit that's been around way before smart-phones, and even unlimited texts.

My hope is that my smart-phone habits can gravitate toward necessity and leisure and away from compulsion. I hope I just pull out my phone to check my maps app when I want to compare travel times and see when the next brown line train rolls in. I hope I check my email when I'm awaiting a particular reply from someone. I hope I check for calls and texts when I'm expecting a call or hoping to hear from someone.

The power we hold in our hands gives us great responsibility. It's up to us what to do with it. St. Paul says when he became a man he gave up childish things. We don't need to lose our childlike awe and wonder - take a picture of a pretty sky or sunset, shoot a fun selfie or two on location - but we do need to discover some degree of maturity in not only owning our freedom but choosing good, choosing presence to what's going on around us as the default rather than falling into tunnel-visioned stupor.

Use your connectivity to bolster relationships, organize yourself, maximize your time, and communicate better. Utilize the technology to make the good stuff happen then let's put our phones down and be with the world and be with others.

I Shall Oblige

What is a holy day of obligation? USCCB can give you an answer, and let me pitch in, too.

Holy days of obligations are special feasts that do not fall on Sundays that we are called to celebrate together. Sometimes it can be frustrating to have to get back to Mass a second time during the week, especially when it can be hard to get there on Sundays in the first place. Some of these special feasts have been translated to Sundays - Ascension and Epiphany sometimes - but this is less than ideal.

We go to these "extra" Masses to celebrate and reflect upon mysteries of our faith directly. Holy days of obligation allow the cycle of Sunday readings to continue uninterrupted and let us make a steady journey through the Scripture laid out for us by the carefully planned lectionary. It also gives specific space to these mysteries - All Saints, Immaculate Conception, etc. - to be considered and prayed over on their own.

Some of these causes for celebration do not come specifically from particular Scriptural narratives but from the understanding of faith that our Tradition affords us, so due reflection on them calls for a greater space than simply readings. Priests' homilies, the prayers of the Mass, and the petitions and personal prayers that follow help us focus on these great mysteries and reflect on the way they can especially illuminate our faith.

Another neat layer here is that the dating of many feasts in the Church come from Tradition that is based on careful considerations and deliberations, and, frankly, fascinating. The dating of Christmas and Easter in the early Church was a long, winding road (forgive the Wikipedia link); the 40 days of Easter before Ascension and 50 days before Pentecost draw milestones from Resurrection narratives, though Pentecost is also based in part on a pre-existing Jewish tradition; the dating of John the Baptist's and Jesus' feasts derive in part from reckoning the perfection of Jesus' life as a "perfect" 9-month pregnancy and John's gestation as one day askew - his birth is celebrated as being June 24, not June 25, though his mother is described as being in her sixth month when Mary visits with Jesus in her womb (one author's more thorough history here).

All are called to celebrate the Eucharist each Sunday, to do this in memory of Christ, as he asked - "this" meaning not just to receive Eucharist, but come together as a community, to be taken, blessed, broken, and shared, to become what we receive, to be sent forth to glorify God by our lives. However, not everyone is called to do this on a daily basis, to be a daily-Mass-goer.

The way to pray and worship for most rests, as usual, in the middle ground. You don't need to go every day, but you can't just go when you feel like it. Sundays are our memorialization of Christ's resurrection, in which we as baptized Christians celebrate the life, death, and rising of Jesus, in whose life, death, and rising we share. So we should all be doing that together and reveling communally in the awesomeness of all that.

While Sunday Eucharist fuels the heartbeat of our sacramental lives of faith, holy days add special depth. Sundays are like visits to your general physician who will give you the comprehensive check-up and can capably tend to any of your maladies; holy days are like specialists who can tend to specific ailings and parts of you.

Holy days call us to reflection upon more specific people and events - Mary, Mother of God, the Ascension of Christ, the communion of saints, the Immaculate Conception... Holy days give us the occasion, and with the help of the Mass, its prayers and readings, its priest and homily, and the community we share, the means by which we can reflect on the mysteries of faith.

Hold the Relish

In periodic news perusings, I found the headline on CNN's website - which is increasingly appearing in giant-fonted all caps - "VICTIM TO CASTRO: 'YOUR HELL IS JUST BEGINNING'".

I'm not even going to begin to imagine the "hell" that this man put these captive women through. He was ruled guilty of seriously heinous crimes (and immoral activities) and sentenced to a whopping term in jail. And rightfully so.

But our attitude toward these people is seriously skewed. These women have every right to vent their anger, frustration, and serious emotional damage in the wake of being liberated. But then what? What happens after our righteous indignation fizzles? These women must live their lives, and this dude will rot in prison.

All of them continue being people. All of them continue to be worthy of being dignified as humans and children of God through mercy and compassion, whether as free women attempting to recover as much as possible or as an indefinitely incarcerated criminal. What attitude do we have toward criminals, especially after our initial outrage fades?

It brings me back to 2011 when news broke that the US had gotten Osama bin Laden. President Obama strode out to a podium to proudly proclaim to the world that the infamous terrorist had been captured and killed, marking a serious milestone in America's war against terror.

How did so many people react? By swarming to huge crowds and cheering the death of another person. It's too nuanced to expect from a mob scene, but I would hope we could celebrate the righteous actions of America (though the morality is arguable) and the advance of freedom at the expense of terrorism. The Church rightfully came out to proclaim that Christians do not rejoice at the death of another - well said by our bishops.

It's an interesting double standard in our increasingly relativist world. People don't want to be held to an absolute, universal moral standard, or to hold others to it, yet there are certain things they can and will get riled up about to the point of mobbing and rioting to proclaim it.

We shouldn't delight in the harm done to another person. We might find peace in justice being done, but we have to withhold our desires to enjoy the trials of others too much. Schadenfreude is a dangerous thing. It is highly tempting to delight in the problems of others. I know I love to see USC and Michigan football struggle, to see players I don't like miss shots or strike out, but I have to try to fence off my delight so it supports the triumph of my team and doesn't relish the fall of others.

I'll always root by butt off for the Cubs, Bears, Bulls, Hawks, and Irish, but I'll be darned if I'll root actively against the White Sox and Cardinals, Packers and Vikings, Pacers and Heat, Red Wings and Blues, or USC and Michigan. It's not worth my energy to begin with. But additionally, true fandom (and love for that matter!) is cheering for your side and not against the other. Victory comes in the success of one side moreso than the failure of another (most of the time).

Such a distinction may be nitpicky; it may even be practically impossible. However, we follow the model of the one dude who did achieve perfection. And in Christ, we have the example of perfect freedom, perfect love, and perfect justice. Perfection may be beyond our grasp, but let's keep seeking it. And let's not delight in the shortcomings of others along the way!