BIG C CATHOLICS

Fr. Charles Irvin Diocese of Lansing ( Click here for Sunday’s readings ) Recently I received an e-mail telling me about cactus plants, a topic that had not in the past provoked much interest on my part. After all, I pictured them to be gawkish and unattractive, although I have seen some cacti that appeared to have surrealistic heads and arms resembling human forms that exercised my imagination. Nevertheless, I read on. Pictures came as attachments to that e-mail, and when I opened them up and viewed those pictures, I was delighted to find that cacti produce stunningly beautiful blossoms, all of which brought me to reassess my judgments about cactus plants. Evidently there was a whole lot more to them than I thought. My “know-it-all” previous judgments about cacti completely blocked me from seeing the beauty that lay hidden within them. That lesson can be applied to the way we see people, especially people about whom we have a “know-it-all” attitude. All of us are familiar

Fr. Charles Irvin Diocese of Lansing ( Click here for Sunday’s readings ) At many points in our lives, we all must face and deal with change, change that requires us to abandon old familiar patterns in which we live and move into new and unfamiliar ways of living. We seem at times to want change and when it occurs, we don’t like it, don’t want it. President Obama promised us change and we find ourselves now in the midst of changes. The collapse of our banking institutions has brought with it changes that are causing us a whole lot of stress. Obviously, our former spending based on credit is undergoing enormous change giving us new patterns of spending and habits of saving money. Fear, loss, anxiety, worry abound within us and around us as we face the joblessness that is on the rise. In times of change our emotions must cope with fear of the unknown. The loss of our sense of security forces us to muster up the courage and strength to enter into what changes bring to us in the

Fr. Charles Irvin Diocese of Lansing ( Click here for Sunday’s readings ) What is the worst four-letter word your child can use? Well, I can imagine some of the words that must have come to your minds. Let me now suggest that the worst four-letter word your child can use is the word can’t. The child who believes he can’t do math will likely not be able to be skilled in mathematics. The child who thinks she can’t compete in sports will likely not try. Both will miss out on the pleasures of success they might otherwise enjoy. Other four-letter words are vulgar and obscene; “can’t” is a deadly word… it deadens one’s spirit. If we tell ourselves that something is impossible then we will in practical effect make it impossible. If we tell ourselves we are unattractive, ugly and unlovable … well, that’s the way we will act and in doing so make ourselves unattractive to others. If we face life’s tasks with a predisposing despair, we will never be able to stop smoking, lose weight, ov

Fr. Charles Irvin Diocese of Lansing ( Click here for Sunday’s readings ) Plans. All of us are familiar with plans. There are family plans, school plans, plans at work, travel plans, game plans, and all sorts of other plans. Our days are lived out in them. Even our fun times are planned… sometimes over-planned. Some people can’t stand plans. They want things to be spontaneous and enjoy the surprises that can come when things are unplanned. Others can’t stand to do anything, and I mean anything, without a plan. They need structure; they go nuts without structures. The world in which we live these days, with all of its many demands, requires us to plan ahead. Few of us have the luxury of unplanned holidays and vacations. Most of us cannot get away unless we plan time for getting away from all the tasks that face us in our everyday weeks, months, and years. In today’s Gospel we heard about the apostles who had been out preaching and had come back to Jesus to report about a

Fr. Charles Irvin Diocese of Lansing ( Click here for Sunday’s readings ) We are in ordinary time now. In the liturgies from Christmas until Pentecost we entered into all that God our Father has done for us, all that His Son has done for us in His birth, life, death, and resurrection. God has sent His Son among us not just to tell us that He loves us, but to share His very life with us. Now it is we who are sent, sent by the the Holy Spirit, who, because of Christ, the Father has sent to us. In today’s Gospel account we reflect on that event in which Jesus summoned the Twelve and first sent them out into their surrounding world. The account is not about something that happened long ago, it is about something that is happening to us in our lives. God, you see, is sending us. Being sent is a commission that occurs because of God’s initiative, not ours. Amos, about whom we heard in the first reading, protested that he was not a prophet. Said he: “I was no prophet, nor have I

Fr. Charles Irvin Diocese of Lansing ( Click here for Sunday’s readings ) Shortly after He began His public ministry, Jesus went back to His hometown of Nazareth. What happened there was very sad. All of the familiar things and people were there — but it was far from being a happy homecoming. They gave Him the cold shoulder and He ended up leaving Nazareth forever. As St. Luke gives the account, the people there in Nazareth froze Him out and then tried to throw Him over a cliff. Why? The whole episode seems terribly strange to you and me. How could an entire town treat Him that way? They were not incredibly mean spirited. St. Mark didn’t give us this account in order to vilify the people of Nazareth. His reason for reporting this event was probably to show us that they were not so very different from you and me. Here we find them standing face to face with God’s very Truth made flesh and blood for us. Here was God offering himself in His only-begotten Son to people just li

Fr. Charles Irvin Diocese of Lansing ( Click here for Sunday’s readings ) What happened to the twelve year old girl who was raised by Jesus from the dead? What happened in the life of the woman who was cured? And what happened to those who knew them? Surely the woman told the story of her healing to her children and grandchildren. Surely the girl’s teenage friends heard of her story and shared her story among their friends. We can only speculate about the impact these miracles had in the lives of those who knew the girl and the woman. Was there an effect of Christ’s miracles in the spiritual lives of the relatives and friends of the girl and the woman? The marvelous love God has shown us in our lives is intended to effect not simply ourselves alone but those around us as well. Our religion is communal, not just individual. Events make their impact on us. When we look around us we see that the war against terrorism is long and it will continue for quite some time. If you are