When It Hurts, Remember You Are an Eternal, Living House

C.S. Lewis has a special way of explaining things….

 

"Imagine yourself as a living house. God comes in to rebuild that house. At first, perhaps, you can understand what He is doing. He is getting the drains right and stopping the leaks in the roof and so on; you knew that those jobs needed doing and so you are not surprised. But presently He starts knocking the house about in a way that hurts abominably and does not seem to make any sense. What on earth is He up to? The explanation is that He is building quite a different house from the one you thought of - throwing out a new wing here, putting on an extra floor there, running up towers, making courtyards. You thought you were being made into a decent little cottage: but He is building a palace. He intends to come and live in it Himself."

 

St. John Paul II: My Favorite Story

April 27, 2014, Divine Mercy Sunday

Canonization of Popes John Paul II & John XXIII

Like many Catholics, I took the death of John Paul II very personally.  My memories of watching the funeral on tv are somewhat hazy – it seems I sat on the couch for days, the whole thing playing out in slow motion.  But I do remember a brief interview of a woman in the crowd of mourners.  This woman had travelled all the way from Mexico to attend the pope’s funeral in Italy.  Why, they asked her, why travel so far?  Her answer is my clearest memory from that sad time, probably because for me, it represented who John Paul II was. 

The woman said that when she was a little girl, John Paul II visited Mexico.  The streets of Mexico City were packed – everyone wanted to get a glimpse of the pope.  She said that as the popemobile drove past, somehow, in the midst of the gigantic crowd, their eyes met.  In that moment, as he looked at her, although they were surrounded by a crowd of thousands, it was as though no one else in the world existed – only the two of them.  In that moment of connection, she felt that he loved her.

The power of that moment was enough to motivate this woman to travel halfway across the world to mourn his death and honor his life.  John Paul II was many things; today he will be remembered in many ways.  I remember him for this moment.  A champion of human dignity, he could look at the whole world, and love each one.

Lessons of the Trees #2: Salvation

I’ve been thinking a lot about Zacchaeus lately.  I’ve always related to the story of his encounter with Jesus, knowing that I too would have had to climb a tree to have the slightest hope of seeing Jesus over a crowd!  It’s a great story for kids – that’s when I remember first hearing it.  I loved to climb trees, and I could just imagine climbing up a tree, and looking down to find Jesus looking up at me.

It’s a bit of an upside-down situation.  We usually look up into the skies to find Jesus.  Even though we know Heaven isn’t in the clouds, and the presence of Jesus is much more complex (or simple) than up or down, the orientation in our minds is Jesus above, ourselves below.  But Zacchaeus, in all of his shortness, and in all of his determination to see Jesus, to figure out who he was, did something that usually only children do.  He climbed a tree, to see over the crowds, to look down and see the face of Jesus for himself.

The real surprise in the story comes when Jesus – cutting through the crowd – hones in on Zacchaeus.  He calls him down from the tree.  He wants to be a guest at Zacchaeus’ house.  And Zacchaeus is utterly transformed by the attention, by Jesus’ desire, by the brief encounter with the man passing through Jericho.

You can bet Zacchaeus scrambled down from that tree.  I don’t know how tall Jesus was, but when they stood together under the sycamore tree, they looked at one another, eye to eye.  And salvation came to the house of Zacchaeus (Lk. 19:9). 

Lessons of the Trees #1: Bearing Fruit

There are almost 400 references to trees in Scripture, many of them producing great bunches of food for thought – from the Tree of Life in the middle of the Garden (Gen. 2:9) to the fertile Tree of the Cross (Gal. 3:13). 

One notable tree reference made by Jesus himself is found in the Parable of the Fig Tree.  It is a short and striking story that – in the tradition of the parables – is both arresting and comforting:

Then he told this parable: ‘A man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard; and he came looking for fruit on it and found none. So he said to the gardener, “See here! For three years I have come looking for fruit on this fig tree, and still I find none. Cut it down! Why should it be wasting the soil?” He replied, “Sir, let it alone for one more year, until I dig round it and put manure on it. If it bears fruit next year, well and good; but if not, you can cut it down” (Lk. 13:6-9).

The urgent message of Jesus found throughout the Gospels should kick us into gear – to realize that bearing fruit isn’t something to put off to another day, or another month, or another year.  He has expectations of us – really, really high ones – and the time to begin fulfilling them is right now.  Love my enemy?  Now.  Stop murdering in my heart?  Now.  Take care of someone forgotten by the world?  Now.  Willingly carry my cross?  Right now.

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But dare we hope that if we fall short, if our buds, flowers and fruits fail another year, that the Gardener may once more advocate on our behalf – and fertilize again – and that the Owner of the Orchard will again wait patiently?  From the heart of God, we learn the lesson of the fig tree.  The patience he requires us to have for one another, he requires of himself; the growth he demands is cultivated in the vineyard of his merciful love.

The Other Side of the Coin

Sacrificing, re-prioritizing, putting others first – that’s one thing.  But what about when others sacrifice for you?  Accepting the sacrifice of others may be just as great a feat, if not greater, than making a sacrifice yourself.  Because when someone sacrifices on your behalf, they are re-organizing their own priorities, shifting their own perspective – they are naming you as the “something else”, the something greater than themselves.  And as self-centered as we all can be, there is still something deep down inside each one of us that resists the possibility that we could actually be worth it.

Think about the last time someone sacrificed for you in a significant way.  Did you recognize what was happening – the shift that was taking place within that person – for you?  Did you allow this to happen?  Did you accept the gift?  Were you a part of that persons’ transformation, a part of that person’s emergence from the cocoon of themselves?

Now let’s think about the sacrifice of the Cross.  From the Cross, Jesus has named you as the “something else”, the something greater.  You are the pearl of great price, worth selling all he had.  This was his desire, his choice:  “No one takes my life from me, but I lay it down” (Jn. 10:18). 

This is the other side of the coin of sacrifice.  From within the shelter of our own cocoons, we have the dangerous ability to empty the Cross of its power.  We have the power to nullify its grace.  Accepting the love, the grace, the power of this great sacrifice is an enormous spiritual feat.  We can only do it from the foot of the Cross, with the recognition that we need him, and that he wouldn’t have it any other way.