Love Large this Lent

Julie Fertsch^[1]

Now…Open your heart…Now is the time…Love Large…

The scripture readings for Ash Wednesday give us tremendous insights into how God wants us to spend this Lenten season.  The first and second readings offer both clarity and a sense of urgency in the messages: EVEN NOW…“Return to me, rend (tear open) your hearts, blow the trumpet, proclaim a fast, call an assembly, gather the people, notify the congregation, assemble the elders, gather the children…NOW is a very acceptable time.  NOW is the day of salvation.”  The time is now!  We are called to be and become someone new right now!  God is at work and wants so much for us to recognize all the wonderful gifts offered in each and every moment.  Why is it so hard for us to stay in the “now” moment?  To recognize God’s presence in the here and now? To not become anxious about tomorrow? Or perhaps what the future will hold?  This moment is really the only moment we have, why not give and open our hearts to it?  Be whole-hearted in it?

In addition, Matthew’s gospel offers us quite a challenge!  I pondered this story for quite some time–contemplating human beings, our motivation, and our need for approval and applause.  However, I was drawn to a deeper insight: Jesus calls us to leave go of the approval and applause and let LOVE be our bottom line.  Let love be at the heart of any prayer and conversation with God and everyone else.  Let love be at the source of all giving, all sacrificing, all good deeds.  When real love—love without condition—is the bottom line, we have no need for applause—the loving is its own reward.

I’d like to share a piece of a story from just a year ago that has everything to do with living whole-heartedly in the present moment, leaving our hearts wide open for God, and love being the bottom line.  Four years ago, when one of my best friends from high school was pregnant with her son, she was diagnosed with cancer.  She fought a good fight with round after round of chemotherapy and radiation, seventeen major surgeries, medications and lengthy hospital stays.  In January of 2011, her diagnosis became terminal—the cancer had metastasized to the bones in her legs and her spine.  We, a large circle of family and friends, spent the next few months accompanying a beautiful woman to her death.  Throughout those months, we were all so keenly aware of the sacredness and fragility of life.  We knew that every moment with this person was worth treasuring.  We savored everything.  We delighted in every hello, smile, and bit of laughter.  With every good-bye came an “I love you.”  We all desperately wanted to be fully present to each moment because we were never sure if a next moment would come again.

Living in and for each moment continuously left our hearts wide open to whatever God and my friend had in store for us that day.  We delighted in the deeper conversations and connections, laughter and surprises, holding hands, sharing meals, stories, prayers, and Eucharist.  Certainly, we suffered with every set back and complication (there were many) and as we watched our friend writhe in pain as the cancer consumed her body.  Our hearts were broken apart as we witnessed her with her son and husband, her parents and grandparents, brothers, cousins, aunts and uncles, and friends–how much love she had for all of us, how she so much wanted to be with and for us, and when the time came, how she courageously surrendered it all.  She taught all of us so much.  We learned to accept our own vulnerability, powerlessness, limitations, and to depend on God and one another for help and strength.  We learned to spend less time on trivial drama and more time on reconciling differences and really loving.

We loved her—that was the bottom line.  We showed up. We did anything we could to stand with her in her suffering, carry a bit of her burden, and alleviate some of her pain.  There were many sleepless nights.  We learned to navigate hospitals, treatments, medications, infections, people, and volumes of emotions.  We made ourselves available to the tasks at hand.  Nothing was too hard.  All was done in the name of love.

My friend died on the last day of Lent.  She lived Lent and she taught us to do the same.  During this Lenten season, instead of “fasting from” or “giving up” something tangible like chocolate or Facebook, pretzels and soda and potato chips, perhaps we might consider how we are simply called to LIVE as whole-hearted participants in each moment, to open our hearts continuously to God’s invitation moment to moment—to recognize the sacredness of “NOW”—that NOW is all we have, and to LOVE LARGE in that very moment.

Is love your bottom line?  I want it to be mine.

[1] Julie Fertsch is an Urban Challenge Associate at the Romero Center, a ministry of the St. Joseph’s ProCathedral in Camden, NJ.

Valentine’s Day: Holy or Horrible?

Mike Laskey

The editor of this blog emailed me with a reminder to submit my next post. “Published on Valentine’s Day,” he wrote, “for better or worse.”

I wanted to write back, “For worse! Clearly, for worse! Cancel it!”

I’ve never been a big fan of Valentine’s Day. As much as I bemoan the commercialization of Christmas, Valentine’s Day seems to be a 100%-Hallmark Holiday, with no redeeming value. Its portrayal in movies and TV shows displays a sort of immature, mushy “love” that doesn’t look anything like love as I know it.

St. Valentine

Not helping its cause is the fact that we really have no idea who St. Valentine was, or if he even existed at all. The conspiracy theorist inside me imagines that about 500 years ago, some bishop who owned a handful of flower shops or had a connection with a monastery that made nice greeting cards decided creating a romantic holiday in the dead of winter with no competing celebrations would be a shrewd business move.

But since I would prefer to not be a spoilsport or cynic, I will grit my teeth and suggest two reasons why I should actually love Valentine’s Day. I’ll see if I convince myself (and yourself, if you’re also a skeptic) by the end. After all, the best way to defend your belief is to consider the good arguments on the other side.

1. The actual legend of St. Valentine has nothing to do with the “mushy” love you reject.

While it’s true we don’t know anything about St. Valentine, the same goes for a number of other favorite saints (St. George, for instance). As I like to say, every saint exists. Some of them actually lived.

The legend of St. Valentine is more like a constellation of a bunch of mini-legends, so let’s just take the earliest-existing one (from Wikipedia):

The first representation of Saint Valentine appeared in the Nuremberg Chronicle (1493); alongside the woodcut portrait of Valentine, the text states that he was a Roman priest martyred during the reign of Claudius II, known as Claudius Gothicus. He was arrested and imprisoned upon being caught marrying Christian couples and otherwise aiding Christians who were at the time being persecuted by Claudius in Rome. Helping Christians at this time was considered a crime. Claudius took a liking to this prisoner – until Valentinus tried to convert the Emperor – whereupon this priest was condemned to death. He was beaten with clubs and stoned; when that failed to kill him, he was beheaded outside the Flaminian Gate.

St. Valentine was so committed to Christian marriage that he faced his own death, which appears to have been anything but quick and painless. (To paraphrase a recent quote I heard, Jesus teaches two things: to love without limit, and that if you do, they’ll kill you for it.)

Now that’s more like it. Not to say we should aspire to face bloody deaths in the name of love. But love definitely requires consistent acts of sacrifice and steady commitment. St. Valentine understood that love is not only a feeling in the heart, but a series of others-centered actions lived day after day. Love is a choice. This is the true message of Valentine’s Day.

2. We give flowers, chocolates, cards, etc. for the same reason we attend Mass on Sunday. You think Mass is important, don’t you?

Giving gifts is an important part of love. It’s fine to believe in your heart that you love your friends or significant other, but that love has to be demonstrated in the world. Given flesh. Incarnated, if you will – with some flowers, or chocolates, or a mix CD.

Of course, each Sunday we celebrate our belief that God’s love for us was made incarnate in the most incredible way in the person of Jesus Christ. God doesn’t need us to show up for Mass, but we do it because it’s one small way we can say: “Thanks for the love, God. Now here’s what I got you.” When we serve those in need, listen to a friend going through a tough time, and, yes, do a little something special for important folks to us on Valentine’s Day, we incarnate God’s love in our own small, humble way.

Now that I’ve thought about it some, I feel newly inspired to claim the holiday for non-mushy love. My challenge to myself and to you is this: In addition to the card and flowers, give of yourself in some intentional way today. Pick a couple of people you love and let them know it in a way that is meaningful to them. Then St. Valentine’s memory, real or not, will be celebrated well.

Can We Reduce Child Mortality? Achieving Millennium Development Goal 4

Martin Rendon^[1]

When the Millennium Development Goals were set back in 2000, it wasn’t clear whether they would be achieved.  A lot could happen between then and 2015, the target year.  And it did:  major terrorist attacks, unprecedented natural disasters, political upheavals of all sorts, wars and civil conflicts, and a global economic crisis.

Despite all that, substantial progress actually has been made on MDG 4, which seeks to reduce by two-thirds – between 1990 and 2015 – the under-five child mortality rate.  That rate has declined from more than 12 million in 1990 to 7.6 million in 2010.  Nearly 21,000 children under five now die every day, about 12,000 fewer than in 1990.^[2]

Child health, nutrition, and access to clean water and sanitation are improving.  Stunting (damage to children’s physical and cognitive development as a result of chronic under-nutrition) declined in developing countries from 40% to 29% between 1990 and 2008.  And there has been progress in preventing HIV among children, with a 24% decline in newly infected children and a 19% decline in children dying from AIDS between 2004 and 2009.

It is commendable that global political leadership has continued to stress the importance of MDG 4.  International organizations, governments, non-governmental organizations, the faith community, the private sector, philanthropic organizations, and individuals have stepped forward in various ways to keep up the pressure to get the job done.  The glass clearly is half full. “We are making the kind of progress which no one would have dared to predict 20 years ago,” UNICEF Executive Director Tony Lake has said. “The advances of 10 years make it clear that the measurable targets of the Millennium Development Goals have had a galvanizing effect in setting priorities and have been associated with remarkable gains.”

Nevertheless, the highest rates of child mortality still are in Sub-Saharan Africa, where 1 child in 8 dies before age five, and in South Asia, where 1 child in 15 dies before age five.  The disparity between these two regions and the rest of the world has grown.

On a worldwide basis, the four major killers of children under five are pneumonia, diarrheal diseases, preterm birth complications, and birth asphyxia.  Under-nutrition is an underlying cause of more than a third of under-five deaths.  Malaria also remains a major killer in Sub-Saharan Africa.

While progress has been made and there is reason for encouragement, MDG 4 frankly will not be realized without stepped up efforts.  As the data show, we are moving ahead and we know what works.   UNICEF and Save the Children UK make the case that an additional $60 billion is needed between 2009 and 2015 to implement a full package of maternal, newborn and child health interventions in the 68 countries with the highest child and maternal mortality levels.

UNICEF further advocates that major gains in child and maternal health best can be achieved by focusing programs and resources on the very poorest women and children in the poorest countries.  Reaching the poorest of the poor not only is the right thing to do, it is the most effective way to save the lives of millions of vulnerable children and their mothers by 2015.

The conventional wisdom has been that reaching better off, more accessible children is the more cost-effective approach.  But the “equity” strategy argues that because needs are greatest among those harder to reach, the benefits of concentrating on them could outweigh the additional costs of reaching them.  In effect, the equity-focused approach improves the return on investments, averting many more child and maternal deaths – and hastening the day when no child dies of preventable causes.

Focusing on the poorest of the poor has a familiar ring.  It was the message of Blessed Teresa of Calcutta’s work, her call to action, and her inspiration to those who seek a world filled with justice, especially for the least of those among us.  To realize MDG 4 really means “taking to scale” (in UN-speak) Mother Teresa’s outreach to the poorest individuals with whom she interacted.

Achieving MDG 4 requires both resources and political will.  In the United States, that means an engaged and active constituency must be mobilized to press the decision-makers in Washington to implement a foreign policy that makes child survival and maternal health a top priority.  Funding for global child and maternal health largely has survived the massive spending cuts made in recent years and made some gains.  But “surviving cuts” is not the way MDG 4 will be realized.  Notwithstanding whatever funding reductions are made, the United States Government still will spend billions of dollars on international assistance.  Supporters of MDG 4 must call for foreign assistance that reflects their values by providing substantial increases in child survival and maternal health.

Can MDG 4 be achieved?  Only if concerned citizens ask their legislators to make it a priority. Children in need know no politics. It is not acceptable that children should die when we have the means to save them.  Will we?

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[1] Marty Rendon is Vice President for Public Policy and Advocacy of the U.S. Fund for UNICEF and a member of St. Francis of Assisi Parish in Triangle, Virginia.

[2] Data cited can be found at the UNICEF site and in Progress in Child Well-Being – Building on What Works (a UNICEF and Save the Children UK report from November 2011). For more information, visit www.unicefusa.org

Lessons from Language Arts

Michael O’Connor^[1]

There are days when I really miss teaching.  Now that I’m no longer directly in the classroom, I can’t help but have an internal running pro/con list.  Sure, there’s the meager pay, long hours of lesson planning and grading, and difficulty in working with the occasional student or parent.  But there’s also the opportunity to observe and facilitate the growth and development of young minds, as well as the tremendous formation of the whole student, intellectually, physically, emotionally, socially, and spiritually.

I loved being a teacher for many reasons, including teaching reading and language arts to middle school students.  One of the best ways I could challenge my students, in all of the ways mentioned above, was to identify a truly great piece of young adult literature.

Now I know what you’re thinking.  Young adult literature?  Isn’t that Twilight and all the other vampire series that have suddenly become best sellers and threaten to transform subsequent generations into blood-sucking, overly-passionate romantics who like really bad television?  Well, I guess that is technically included in the genre.  But thankfully, young adult literature is much richer than that.  It includes stories like The Giver and The Hunger Games that question the role of power and illustrate the bravery of those who stand for justice.  It highlights significant lessons from history while helping readers identify with young heroes, such as in Number the Stars.  And it encourages readers to learn more about new cultures and new peoples, branching out from their own world to expand both their mind and heart.

One such story is The House on Mango Street by Sandra Cisneros.  It chronicles the life of Esperanza Cordero, a Latina girl in Chicago, who slowly learns about herself, her family, and her neighborhood through short vignettes, small glimpses into her blossoming mind.  One episode, entitled Those Who Don’t (Cisneros 28) which I re-read recently, struck a chord within me and reminded me why I love young adult literature.

Here, Esperanza comments on outsiders who are scared to come into her Latino Chicago neighborhood.  She vividly describes their fears saying, “They think we will attack them with shiny knives.”  She knows she is considered “dangerous.”  After acknowledging this, Esperanza shares why there is no need to be afraid, at least from her perspective.  Yes, it’s “all brown all around,” but she knows the people walking around, deemed suspicious and dangerous by outsiders, are just people.  They are “Davey the Baby’s brother,” the one called “Fat Boy, though he’s not fat anymore, nor a boy,” and “Rosa’s Eddie V.”  Perhaps what’s most powerful, though, is when Esperanza admits her own fear of other neighborhoods stating, “But watch us drive into a neighborhood of another color and our knees go shakity-shake and our car windows get rolled up tight and our eyes look straight.  Yeah.  That is how it goes and goes.”

Only for middle school students, right?

In these past few weeks, I’ve watched the Archdiocese of Philadelphia announce 45 school closings.  I’ve listened to President Barack Obama announce the need for tax reform and more equal opportunities and rights for all those living in America.  These announcements point to one thing:  change.

Change is inevitable all around us.  We may not like change, and sometimes it isn’t justified.  Nevertheless, change happens.  It is our decision how we respond to it and how we interact and consider others in the process.

When schools close and merge, communities merge, as well.  Sometimes these communities are very different from one another.  When our President asks us to consider reforming the tax code, we start comparing the rich and the poor, the 99% and the 1%.  Regardless of your stance on these issues, changes will come, with decisions towards one side or the other.  Or perhaps even through compromise.

But in these moments of change, I think Esperanza from The House on Mango Street is on to something.  We are separated, physically and mentally, by difference and stereotype.  Race, ethnicity, and socio-economic status define our neighborhoods and determine where we want to live, work, hang out on the weekends, send our children to school, and attend Mass on Sundays.

Esperanza’s thoughts make me stop and think.  My Catholic elementary, middle, and high schools all closed back home in NEPA.  I remember how I felt when I heard about the closings and mergers and learned that students from my schools would have to go to other schools in other neighborhoods.  I was furious, upset, and confused.  And probably, at the heart of it, I was afraid of people from different neighborhoods because I didn’t know them.  Not for any one reason or another.  But because I was human.

Even today, living and working in Philadelphia, regardless of how intentional I am to think otherwise, I am afraid of certain neighborhoods.  I carry these stereotypes, these fears with me.  I do my best to confront them, to combat them, but they are still present.

I do not have all of the answers on how to confront these issues, but I think the first thing is to step outside of our comfort zone and try to look at people and neighborhoods with new eyes of faith and justice.  By seeking new perspective, by seeing their humanity, the face of Christ, we can grow closer in love, more deeply in compassion and understanding, and challenge our stereotypes presented by society, others, and ourselves.

Sometimes the hardest facts to acknowledge are presented in unexpected ways.  For me, The House on Mango Street was that source.  Perhaps the lessons from Esperanza will have meaning for us all in the myriad of changes we face through school closings and mergers, a shifting political landscape, and the opportunity to interact with new neighborhoods and new people.

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[1] Michael O’Connor is the Assistant Director of Programs for the Alliance for Catholic Education at Saint Joseph’s University (ACESJU), a post-graduate teaching fellows program that serves urban Catholic schools in Philadelphia.  Originally from Kingston, PA (in a region fondly referred to as “NEPA”), he received his M.Ed. from the Alliance for Catholic Education Service Through Teaching program at the University of Notre Dame while teaching middle school for two years in Birmingham, AL.  He is proud to now call Philadelphia home.

Wellspring of Justice

Brian Reavey

I did not have a full appreciation and understanding for the life (and death) of Martin Luther King, Jr. until I went to college.  And I’m embarrassed to even write that.  I grew up in rural New Jersey, and I was not exposed to many different cultures during my childhood.  It’s not that my parents didn’t want to make us more aware; however, there weren’t many people who were much different from us where I grew up.  As one of many caucasians, I can still name the 3 African-American students in my entire high school.

As a sophomore at the University of Dayton, I enrolled in a course that would shift the course of my life forever.  The class was called “Faith & Justice,” and I was changed indefinitely as a result.  Taught by Professor Doyle, he engaged us with stories, books, and personal testimonies from people like Gandhi, Dorothy Day, Archbishop Oscar Romero, Mother Teresa, and Martin Luther King, Jr.  It was King’s “Letter from a Birmingham Jail” that allowed me to fully understand the connection between faith and justice.  It was his faith in and love for Jesus that formed King’s every word and decision.  His imprisonment sparked freedom for so many in the name of Christianity.

Some 16 years after that life-changing class in college, I find myself embarrassed yet again.  Just last week I sat in church with about 100 young people and 20 adults who participated in a “Martin Luther King, Jr. Day of Service.”  During the closing prayer service, we listened to a large portion of King’s “I Have a Dream” speech.  From my vantage point in the pew, as I heard and felt King’s chilling dreams run through my entire body, I could see the large picture of King with a giant crucifix behind him.  It took that visual image to remind me that I had forgotten about the important connection between King’s faith and his fight for justice.  For the past 7 years, King’s holiday merely marked an available Monday in January for an annual meeting I always facilitated because it was an easy weekend for people to travel.  With time and tasks eroding the true meaning, I failed to properly mark the remembrance of an incredible human being who was the voice for so many who were voiceless.

Let me make a solemn vow to never forget the true meaning of the important holiday we just celebrated.  And may I never forget the faith and non-violent fight for justice in which King lived (and died) for.  In honor of this inspiring man’s legacy, I leave you with one of my favorite quotes from Martin Luther King, Jr.:  “Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that.  Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.”  May you bear light and bring love wherever you go on life’s journey.

Not As Planned

Martha Dudich

If we titled our holiday experiences, this Christmas season recently ended would be dubbed “Not As Planned.”  Let me say right away that I am not, by nature, a planner, much to the exasperation of several previous employers.  There were those who thrived on long range planning, often 5 years in advance, while others went pretty much by the seat of their pants, a mere 5 minutes in advance.  My goal was somewhere in between.

Having enjoyed an extraordinary dozen days in Scotland, I returned just before Thanksgiving. Suddenly it was Advent and, astonishingly just 4 weeks later, Christmas.

I’ve been a working liturgist for close to 4 decades, so you’d imagine I’d have seen this coming.  In October, I happily began serving a new worship community and it seemed to require much more of me and my time: extra rehearsals and services and a surprising amount of unfamiliar music that called for quite a bit of practicing.  As December days stacked up behind me, I took to making lists, which morphed into something of a holiday spreadsheet taking on a life of its own, complete with soundtrack, lighting cues and MapQuest directives.  Most of this was to prompt my rapidly fading memory.  If I didn’t document the necessary tasks – buy Christmas tree, accompany pageant rehearsal, feed neighbor’s cats – there was a very good chance I’d simply forget.  I could certainly celebrate the Incarnation without a tree, the show would go on (albeit quietly), but the neighbors might never forgive me.

One by one, carefully calculated windows of opportunity slammed shut.  At least that was the initial feeling.  Rehearsals scheduled for 2 hours stretched to 4.  The tree farmer who had schlepped a few hundred Douglas firs down from Vermont every December, always saving me the smallest one, must have decided it really is better in the Bahamas and, alas, the firehouse parking lot was empty when I arrived.  Oliver and Tom, the aforementioned neighboring felines, were quite perturbed at being deserted and sought revenge on the holiday décor.  So while I never did decorate a tree in my own home, I did get to reconstruct the one next door!

Each of my intended yet thwarted arrangements seemed to allow for something else.  Not necessarily better or worse, but different.  Not as planned.  And when I was paying attention, I had to admit all was well.  I cheered the pint-sized pageant players, whether shining stars or stubborn sheep, bringing the tender nativity story to life once more.  The empty firehouse lot did not remain a dead end, but segued into an impromptu supper with my beloved nephew just home on semester break.  Cookies did not get baked.  Visiting cousins only came together by phone.  Festive dinners were suspended to stand with friends in sudden sorrow.  And baby Jesus never made it into the manger.

On several occasions earlier in December I had chided those whose crèches already had the Christ Child front and center.  “Not until Christmas,” I insisted.  “And get those wise men out of there.  They’re still miles away!”  How sweet my childhood memory of our manger scene, sans the infant figure who would be making his way from the other end of the house, day by day, guided not by a star but my mother, bringing him room to room, blessing every space.  When my sister and I would awaken to him on our bedside table, the awe was palpable. Together with my mother we would sing the familiar carol. “Be near me, Lord Jesus, I ask thee to stay, close by me forever and love me, I pray.”  When the figure was moved to my grandmother’s room, we heard her special prayers in Hungarian and always sensed she was a bit more patient with us, even cooking some of our favorite meals.  On Christmas Eve we would return from church and my mother would place baby Jesus in the stable on top of our television set.  More singing: “Oh come, let us adore him, Christ the Lord.”

This year, not as planned.  While I did remember to contact friends in Pittsburgh and Manhattan on Christmas Eve morning to reveal where I had hidden their infant crèche figures, I had not managed to find my own!  At least not in time for the feast.  Fortunately I am a proud sponsor of all twelve days of Christmas and appreciate the true wisdom of our liturgical season.  A week into Christmastide, I unearthed the box containing my cast of natal characters, somewhat tardy but happy to be home.  And accompanied by leaping lords, milking maids, swimming swans and my own curious cats, the vagabond wise ones quickened their journey down the stairs, across the mantel and onto the dining room table by Epiphany afternoon.

In the Western Church, we end the Christmas season with the feast of Christ’s baptism by John in the Jordan.  This year, with a rather unusual application of liturgical calendaring, it occurred the day right after Epiphany Sunday.  While we generally have a week between these feasts, with profound readings touching their deepest meanings, on Monday morning I couldn’t help but feel somewhat cheated.  I turned to the readings of the day, some of my favorite in all scripture.  Here is my servant whom I uphold, my chosen one with whom I am pleased. . .I have called you for the victory of justice. . .a light. . .to open eyes that are blind. . .to release those who sit in darkness. (from Isaiah 42)  By virtue of our baptism, you and I hear the same words Jesus heard in the water: You are my beloved one.  My favor rests on you.  Perhaps, like me, you dozed through your baptism, so listen up now.  You are my beloved one.  My favor rests on you.  In that moment Jesus received his identity and his work could begin.  You and I received nothing less.

Just as planned.

The Spirituality of Ordinary Times

Michael Laskey

The Christmas season technically ended yesterday, on the Feast of the Baptism of the Lord. Our extended celebration of the season is a mirror image of the timeline that most of the world uses: We start the party on the 25^th (as opposed to the Friday after Thanksgiving), and continue on into January. We sing carols at Mass when Christmas music has been off the radio for two weeks. On December 30^th, I saw Easter decorations on sale at a dollar store. It feels like we arrived late to some awesome party, and all the other revelers are putting on their coats just when we’re getting into it. “Hold on. Don’t leave yet,” I wanted to yell on Epiphany. “I brought eggnog!”

It’s a western temptation to rush into the next thing, even for us churchy folk. At two different meetings last week, one at the parish where I work and one here at CFJ, I was involved in discussions about Lent. Indeed, Lent is just around the corner (Ash Wednesday kicks things off on February 22), and we have to get a move on planning events and newsletters, video projects and reflection guides.

But we do have on our hands these six weeks of what the church calls “Ordinary Time,” a small chunk of it compared to the marathon that stretches from Pentecost all the way to Advent.

Ordinary Time seems, well, not that interesting when compared to the richness of the other seasons: Advent’s candles, Christmas’ familiar tunes and nativity scene, Lent’s fasting and quiet feeling, Easter’s flowers and Alleluias. I only know one thing about Ordinary Time: Its color is green.

There must be something important about it, though, or it wouldn’t have survived for 2000-ish years. I decided to look closer.

The first and only stop on my investigation was Wikipedia, which doesn’t have much to offer here, besides Ordinary Time’s Latin name, which is Tempus per annum, literally “time through the year.” So I’ll turn to favorite piece of writing these days, David Foster Wallace’s 2005 Kenyon College commencement address, This is Water. The speech isn’t about the liturgical year per se, but it has that power of good art to shed light on a wide range of experiences. Today, it strikes me as the perfect articulation of what I’ll call “The Spirituality of Ordinary Times.”

If you’re up for it, I’d invite you to stop reading my reflection now and click over to This Is Water, and then come back, if you still have time. (Or you can listen to Wallace deliver  the speech here.

Pay close attention to the section describing the checkout line at a grocery store. (A word of warning: the language gets a little crispy at times.)

In the address, Wallace argues that education should enable us to break out of our hard-wired self-centeredness and view the world from the perspective of others. In a terrible grocery store line or in a traffic jam or in dealing with an annoying co-worker or family member, I can feel bitter, angry, and sorry for myself – or I can choose to think about the other, and what they might be thinking or feeling. As a friend of mine likes to say, “We don’t see things as they are. We see things as we are.”

How we respond in the face of the mini frustrations and challenges of daily life says as much about our spiritual disposition as do Mass attendance and time spent in works of service and justice. Finding the face of Christ in a tired cashier is probably the last thing on our minds after a difficult day at work, but searching for God always – in good times, bad times, and ordinary times – is at the heart of our Christian call.