Preference Paths

 Often town planners look at the routes people take in deciding how to modify roads or footpaths. We often see this when people have their favorite rabbit runs to cut through suburbs to arrive at their destination more quickly. In a similar way, you see the tracks where people walk being worn down by foot traffic. Each of these decisions looks at the best way of arriving at our destination more quickly. Also in the second place it looks at our preferred traveling companion who we want to accompany us on the way. This allows us to notice not just the direction we are heading but also who we join us on the way.

The question is not just about noticing our own identity that can be defined by our family and friends but also who we welcome into our orbit. It allows us to appreciate that we are called to be who are in our relationships with others. Jesus expands the orbit beyond what is familiar and focuses on how we are called to become disciples. This growth in holiness assumes that our lives are deeply influenced by another. Matthew continues to ask us to notice how our lives are to be orientated towards God and not just to our own parochial interests. He calls us to be transformed from the inside out and to notice how we are called to live in a way that guides our thinking, our speaking, and our acting.

This is an orientation to our true self seen through the eyes of God. We are called to live in a way that builds on good foundations where we are blind to our own self-interest and moved more clearly towards God's-interest. Often this can be portrayed as polar opposites but rather it is a correcting of our aim to actually see the good entrusted to us as being lived not just for ourselves but for the good of all creation. This is about expanding our hearts to discover God's preferences for us and not just our own. When our hearts are in tune with God we discover that we can love from the heart and with all our soul. Our thinking is motivated by this motivation and it channels where we spend our time, energy, and resources. The preferential option is not just what I want but who God desires me to become. In this way our preference paths guide others to discover their own way of life that calls us out of the darkness.

Seeking Good News

So often we wake to news that is not good. We read of accidents, tragedies and natural disasters. We often hear also of people's misdeads and betrayals. With such a constant diet of misery and misfortune who can blame anyone for shutting down. We can only take so much without trying to retreat into our own privatised world.

Yet the Gospel seeks for us to become detectives of grace. To listen for the hidden wisdom and the sheltered word. This is a proclamation that gently recreates us and unites us in faith. No longer are we called to be strangers to each other or aliens in our own land. The searching for the meaning at the heart of life reveals that we are not the sum of our fears. We are children of hope called to witness to our faith in every age. We are not victims of circumstance but agents of compassion. 

May we seek this truth everyday and be present to God in our everyday lives. 

Learning to become shepherds

 There is often a portrayal of sheep as being easily misled, vulnerable, and moving as a mob. They are easily spooked by fears that may be as commonplace as a gust of wind, a sudden noise, or the appearance of a stranger. But they also seek out good pastures and seek to stay close to each other. Like all living things they provide gifts that are not just fleece and food! They also help us to discover how to slow down and become present in the environment in which we live.

When Jesus chose the image of the good shepherd he sought to provide an understanding that he came to live among them. Pope Francis often talks about having the smell of the sheep on the person who pastures the flock. This is important because it means that a person lives in the same conditions as them and does not hold himself aloof from their daily struggles. It is one of the realities of being a priest that we are not to lord it over others but rather listen to their stories and become one with them.

This is probably counter-intuitive as we see people in leadership being removed from the everyday struggles of people. This distance can seem to them trying to control, direct or manage the mob rather than being part of the mob. The call that Jesus places on our hearts to take on their labor and at times be willing to carry them along. In this we discover that the kingdom of God is within us and that God lends his ear to those that seek to be led. Today we notice how he seeks to cure the sick, raise those who are deadened to life, cleanse human hearts, and purge us of all that alienates us from God and each other.

Learning to love what is unlovable

 The three feasts that we celebrate during the conclusion of Eastertide are at the heart of living the Christian life. Pentecost shows that The Holy Spirit is entrusted to us so that we can experience the love of God, The Trinity shows us how to grow in a total self-giving relationship with the other, while The Feast of the Body and Blood of Christ shows us that this love is tangible and offers our whole self for the good of others. It is the call to grow in a nuptial love that is not just centered on what I want but to discover what it is to love what is unlovable. This is at the heart of our lives in learning to love like God.

The heart of the Christian life is to grow into the heart of God. In our prayers, we discover it is not even about the quality or quantity of our prayers. This helps us to notice that our prayer is not just about how we feel or the amount of time we spend in prayer but rather that we become present to God in prayer. This is probably the most difficult discipline of prayer in actually showing up and discovering that our faithfulness to being present is at the heart of God. We show up even when we don't feel like it. This is the obedience of being willing to listen to God when our whole being rails against listening and would prefer to do our own thing. It means that we trust our whole selves to God even if we don't feel like it.

It also shows us the mutuality in seeking to love the other person even in their fragility, incompleteness, and sinfulness. This talks about how God seeks to be in a nuptial relationship with us and enter most deeply into a relationship that is all about giving and receiving the love of another. The mutual loving of another is known as the return model where love responds to love. This is what we are called to learn at the heart of a relationship. This is true in whatever state of life we are called to live our life. The central question is how am I called to love this other person even when I discover behaviors that I hate. This does not mean we compromise ourselves by just doing what the other person wants but rather discovering who it is that I need to be for them. I can only be myself but I can be myself for the good of the other. This chaste way of living allows us to see love through the eyes of another.

This then leads us to know what skin is in the game. This is not just loving as a part-time profession or a feel-good activity that we undertake on our terms. This will cost us everything in learning to love like God. In fact, this is the reality of the Incarnation that God shows up when we discover what is unlovable about our life. God actually turns up not because we have everything all together but because everything seems to be falling apart. This is not cheap grace because it costs the whole self for the good of the other. Our humanity protests that this is too much and that God cannot be serious but the divine call of ultimate poverty is that in giving everything we receive everything. In fact, this is the paradox of the Christian life we only discover ourselves when we fully give ourselves without the expectation of a particular reward. It also changes what we do when we discover fragility, frailty, and alienation within ourselves the call is not to eradicate "the sin" but to surrender everything to God.

So this is learning to love like God in discovering how we are called to be loved into life. As we enter what is called ordinary time we discover the extraordinary love of God that surrenders everything to us so that we can surrender everything to God,