When Dating Gets Real – For the Young and "Old"

This article appears in the Catholic Standard & Times this week. It’s directed to teens (but could also apply to teens at heart 😉

How can I bring God into a dating relationship? What a powerful question — but I feel I should warn you right from the start, that’s dangerous business.

Once you let God in, there’s no telling where things might end up. In the immortal words of Kip Dynamite, you just might find your “soul-mate” and be ridiculously at peace for the rest of your life.

First off, I think we should revisit just what we mean when we speak of the reality of God. I think this is key, because the world can often distort the true image of God. The clear waters of our baptism can get a little muddied by our personal sins, and a true image of God can get twisted into something either scary, distant, or always wagging a finger at us when we mess up. Is that God?

Let’s go back to the beginning. Remember when you were 5 or 6 years old, and the world was one big wonderland? Everything was a gift then, wasn’t it? From a snack to a bike ride to snowflakes. Here’s the thing: We need to see everything still as a gift, as something flowing from the Giver that is meant to bring us joy. That counts for people, too. So as you grow older, meet new friends, start dating, the best attitude is to see in everything the gift that God wants to give. A mystic named Caryll Houselander once said, “Every ordinary thing in your life is a word of God’s love. Your home, your work, the clothes you wear, the air you breathe, the food you eat… the flowers under your feet are the courtesy of God’s heart flung down on You! All these things say one thing only: “See how I love you.'” Wow.

So who is God? Ultimately the One whose love is the seed of all loves.

If that’s the case, how could we not have Him as a part, and, indeed, the heart, of all our relationships, especially the ones that have the spark of love in them? If we keep God (a.k.a. Love) out of our relationships, then what are they based on?

Startling News

All that is good, true, and beautiful participates in God.

When you see a great movie that moves you, and you talk about it, you’re sharing in God. When you go to visit your boyfriend’s sick grandfather, or go to Mass on a Sunday with your girlfriend (a great idea) you’re living in God. When you walk in the fields together and you’re struck by the beauty of creation, you are both sharing in the beauty of the Creator.

If you’re an honest seeker of the good, the true and the beautiful, then you already have God at the heart of your relationships. The next step is naming this — acknowledging Him — not being afraid to admit that He’s the One you want at the heart of your dating. (It’s a great way to clear away superficiality and pettiness, trust me.)

Letting God into our dating is a real adventure. It keeps things real, and wakes us up to the miracle of our uniqueness — the uniqueness of everyone, every shade and texture on this coat- of-many-colors that is the human family. That is not easy, especially for teenagers with the weight of peer pressure bearing down. But we must look into each other’s eyes. We must return to that innocence and openness that we had as children, looking, seeing, receiving the gift, not grasping at it. If we see dating as sharing in God’s gifts, then life will become that adventure.

There’s a line at the end of Les Miserables: “To love another person is to see the face of God.” Wow. Take that one to the dating scene. Make respectful love the first move, not lust, and you’ll find God in the center of that relationship.

Let the journey begin.

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Inspiration for the New Evangelization
http://www.missionmoment.org

The Miraculous Staircase

Here is the story on that mysterious staircase…

“Two mysteries surround the spiral staircase in the Loretto Chapel: the identity of its builder and the physics of its construction. When the Loretto Chapel was completed in 1898, there was no way to access the choir loft twenty-two feet above. Carpenters were called in to address the problem but they all concluded access to the loft would have to be via ladder as a staircase would interfere with the interior space of the small Chapel. Legend says that to find a solution to the seating problem, the Sisters of the Chapel made a novena to St. Joseph, the patron saint of carpenters. On the ninth and final day of prayer, a man appeared at the Chapel with a donkey and a toolbox looking for work. Months later the elegant circular staircase was completed, and the carpenter disappeared without pay or thanks. After searching for the man (an ad even ran in the local newspaper) and finding no trace of him, some concluded that he was St. Joseph himself, who came in answer to the sisters’ prayers.

The stairway’s carpenter, whoever he was, built a magnificent structure. The design was innovative for the time and some of the design considerations still perplex experts today. The staircase has two 360 degree turns and has no visible means of support. Also, it is said that the staircase was built without nails—only wooden pegs. Questions also surround the number of stair risers compared to the height of the choir loft and about the types of wood and other materials used in the stairway’s construction.”

– from www.lorettochapel.com

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Inspiration for the New Evangelization
http://www.missionmoment.org

The Faithful Traveler website!

If you’re looking for the website we just spoke of on the Heart of Things radio broadcast, here it is! And thanks to Diana and David von Glahn for an awesome and inspiring ministry!

www.thefaithfultraveler.com

“The world is a book, and those who do not travel read only a page.”

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From their website:

About The Faithful Traveler

The Faithful Traveler™ is a travel show with a Catholic focus. The show’s host, Diana von Glahn, will explore the art, architecture, history, and doctrine behind the many shrines and places of pilgrimage throughout the United States and beyond. You’ll learn about the faith and tradition of the Catholic Church and gain helpful information to plan your own pilgrimages.

Diana von Glahn has been including shrines, churches, and places of pilgrimage in her travel itineraries for as long as she can remember. As a lifelong Catholic, she has always loved the feeling of home that each Catholic location brings, no matter where it is. Through The Faithful Traveler™, she hopes to share her love of these amazing sites with others, and help them learn about the wonders of the Catholic faith and tradition. She researches, writes, and performs in each show, and she helps her husband David edit the show and choose music for each episode.

Click here for their map of the USA’s Catholic shrines and holy places!

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Inspiration for the New Evangelization
http://www.missionmoment.org

Feast of the Conversion of St. Augustine

A tribute to St. Augustine, as we celebrate his life 1620 years after his baptism!
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“Augustine’s life as a young man was characterized by loose living and a search for answers to life’s basic questions.

He would follow various philosophers, only to become disillusioned with their teachings. For nine years he was associated with the Manichean sect. But he gradually became aware that Manicheism was unable to provide sastisfactory answers to his probing questions.

At this time, Augustine was teaching rhetoric in Milan. He went to hear the preaching of Saint Ambrose, the Bishop of Milan. At first he went only to hear Ambrose’s eloquent style of speaking. But the Bishop’s preaching led Augustine to a new understanding of the Bible and the Christian Faith.

Some time in the year 386, Augustine, his mother Monica, his son Adeodatus, and several friends, were spending time in Cassiciacum, a small village near Milan. While outdoors, Augustine heard the voice of a child singing a song, the words of which were, “Pick it up and read it. Pick it up and read it.” He thought at first that the song was related to some kind of children’s game, but could not remember ever having heard such a song before.

Then, realizing that this song might be a command from God to open and read the Scriptures, he located a Bible, picked it up, opened it and read the first passage he saw. It was from the Letter of Paul to the Romans. Augustine read:

Not in carousing and drunkenness, not in sexual excess and lust, not in quarreling and jealousy. Rather, put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the desires of the flesh.
-Romans 13: 13-14

Reading this scripture, Augustine felt as if his heart were flooded with light. He turned totally from his life of sin. He was Baptized by Ambrose during the Easter Vigil April 24, 387. His friend Alypius and his son Adeodatus were Baptized at the same time.

Later, reflecting on this experience, Augustine wrote his famous prayer: You have made us for yourself, Lord, and our hearts are restless until they rest in you. He went on to become a powerful influence on the spirituality and theology of the Christian Church.”

– Taken from: http://www.midwestaugustinians.org/saints/s_augconversion.html

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Inspiration for the New Evangelization
http://www.missionmoment.org

This Will Never Happen Again

A fellow teacher sent us an e-mail today pointing out the fact that at 3 minutes and 4 seconds after 2 AM on the 6th of May this year, the time and date will be 02:03:04 05/06/07

Is that cool or what? Worth staying up to experience? That's another question!

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Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless handheld

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Inspiration for the New Evangelization
http://www.missionmoment.org

The Wait of Glory

I didn’t watch the news coverage last week, other than a 10 second blurb. I haven’t clicked on a single video from www.cnn.org. I saw a picture of Choh, but I have yet to read a full article anywhere on the story of Virginia Tech. I don’t want to hear about the “record” set, or find a scapegoat to blame for the mistakes made in the two hours between shootings.

I want to look at people’s faces.

I stopped in a Wawa last Tuesday, and I found myself captivated by the tiny hands of the Russian girl in front of me, with her little pink purse. I was mystified by the big man with the tattoos and the dark greasy hair writing a check at the register. I was captured by the haltered step of an elderly man in a grey suit, making his way towards the soda machine, moving slowly through the noise and haste.

Where did these people come from? Where were they going? Did they each have a person they could talk to, pour out their hearts to, share silences with in the wake of all this violence? As numbing as the horror of this past week has been, I’ve been trying to reflect on the beauty of people’s faces. Trying to see into them a little bit more. I am convinced that the way back into sanity and peace and a sincere love for others is through the human face. Through a deep insearching, a contemplation of the gifts that surround us in the gift of each other.

“It is a serious thing to live in a society of possible gods and goddesses, to remember that the dullest and most uninteresting person you talk to may one day be a creature which, if you saw it now, you would be strongly tempted to worship, or else a horror and a corruption such as you now meet, if at all, only in a nightmare. All day long we are, in some degree, helping each other to one or other of these destinations. It is in the light of these overwhelming possibilities, it is with the awe and the circumspection proper to them, that we should conduct all our dealings with one another, all friendships, all loves, all play, all politics. There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal. Nations, cultures, arts, civilization — these are mortal, and their life is to ours as the life of a gnat. But it is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub, and exploit — immortal horrors or everlasting splendours.”

These words from C.S. Lewis’ Weight of Glory essay have always captivated me. They are the natural fruit of our meditation on our creation in the image of God. Do we follow through with the logic? If so then what we see should be just this; walking miracles, moving and breathing monuments to the presence of God in the world.

“This does not mean that we are to be perpetually solemn. We must play. But our merriment must be of that kind (and it is, in fact, the merriest kind) which exists between people who have, from the outset, taken each other seriously — no flippancy, no superiority, no presumption. And our charity must be a real and costly love, with deep feeling for the sins in spite of which we love the sinner — no mere tolerance or indulgence which parodies love as flippancy parodies merriment. Next to the Blessed Sacrament itself, your neighbour is the holiest object presented to your senses.” (C.S.Lewis, Weight of Glory)

In his letter Novo Millennio Ineunte, Pope John Paul II called us to this holy reverence for one another. It is the cure for this modern madness, for this isolation and fear, for this complete denial of the beauty and worth of the person. The healing must begin, the wait has been too long. May we come to see the light of God shining on the face of our brothers and sisters around us, light streaming from our Creator in Whose divine image we are all fashioned. Today let’s treasure the gift of each other, the miracle of the human face in all it’s many shades, moods, emotions and reactions. Let’s not pass by these miracles, on the trains, roads, hallways, bus stations, or even in those fleeting moments before the mirror throughout the day.

For the Word that is God has become flesh, and even now moves among us…

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Inspiration for the New Evangelization
http://www.missionmoment.org

On This Earth Day Weekend

Some sweet words from the Man:

How could we not feel surrounded by the love of God who opens before us the book of nature and invites us to read there the signs of his presence and tenderness? Far from daily life, which is often frantic and unfortunately sometimes alienating, in this delightful mountain spot we have the opportunity to rediscover the grandeur of God and man in the beauty of creation, and we are invited to achieve a fuller harmony with the Artisan of the universe. – Pope John Paul II

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Inspiration for the New Evangelization
http://www.missionmoment.org

A Video Tribute to Pope John Paul II

I discovered this beautiful tribute to Pope John Paul II this morning on YouTube. The collection of photographs alone is spectacular, and add to it a beautiful song “Be Not Afraid” written just for John Paul by the singer Janelle. Powerful stuff!

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Inspiration for the New Evangelization
http://www.missionmoment.org

Extremists Threaten Church in Baghdad

This from the Church in the Middle East, reported on www.zenit.org

BAGHDAD, Iraq, APRIL 19, 2007 (Zenit.org).- Christian churches in Baghdad have been forced to remove crosses as threats from Islamic extremists cause pressure to mount.

Wednesday was the bloodiest day in Baghdad since the start of U.S. security operations. Nearly 200 people were killed in a string of attacks in Iraq’s capital. Meanwhile AsiaNews reported new threats to Christians.

The churches in the Dora region, a Christian quarter of Baghdad, have received threats from an unknown Islamic group, which warned: “Get rid of the cross or we will burn your churches.”

Chaldean Auxiliary Bishop Shlemon Warduni of Baghdad told AsiaNews: “In the last two months many churches have been forced to remove the crosses from their domes.

“In the case of the Church of St. George, in Assira, Muslim extremists took the situation into their own hands: They climbed onto the roof and ripped down the cross.”

Bishop Warduni added that “in the Chaldean Church of St. John, in Dora, which has been without a pastor for months, the parishioners themselves decided to move the cross to a safer place following repeated threats.”

The Church of Sts. Peter and Paul has received the same threats but so far has withstood the intimidation.

Ultimatum

AsiaNews reported that the same unknown Islamic group active in Dora seems to have delivered an ultimatum to the Christian community there: Convert to Islam or die.

– www.zenit.org

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God bless the lovers of Christ in this region and may He give them the courage they need to be faithful to that cross. Crucified Love is the only way to truly win hearts. Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you. May this crucified love melt the cold hearts of their aggressors!

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Inspiration for the New Evangelization
http://www.missionmoment.org

Empty. . .

Suffering scours and scrapes us clean.

Then alone, we are hollow.
Empty as the heart of a mountain,
rough-hewn by the cuts of sin and sorrow.

Sitting in our stone-carved solitudes, clattering, words falling like rocks, who does not ultimately long to be filled? To be answered?

We come of age and reach that “cross”-road where a choice must be made. A turn to the right or the left, a turn within or a turn without.

Do we believe? Is there a hand reaching into our wounded sides to touch our trembling hearts? Will it take hold of our fear and pour it out? Is this a hand we can trust?

Will we take it or will we fear again what this pierced hand holds out to us?
Will we run from Crucified Love?

Running will not heal the hurt. We must put aside the pills and ask for no more substitutes. No more Babelling Towers that rise up to our own hollow heavens. We must turn back to Love.

Love that was born in a cave in the earth.
Love that was buried in a tomb in the earth.

We find Him suffering too, scoured and scraped clean by sorrow,
our sorrow, all sorrow, heaped up and balanced on His back.

Didn’t we notice He was there?
In the classroom, in the alleyway, on the gallows, under mortar fire and in the ocean deep and cold? Where else would Love be?

All death and sorrow has been swallowed up in His death.
All tears and madness are consumed in His dying.
All tombs will someday be empty because of Him.

So let’s come before Crucified Love and weep; then let’s peer inside and see.

Until we recognize Him in all of this, we are in the dark, alone, outside an empty tomb…
struggling to make sense of ourselves without Him.

Seeking the living among the dead.

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Inspiration for the New Evangelization
http://www.missionmoment.org