God builds a house for me

In the Second book of Samuel, when David thinks of building a house for the Ark of the Covenant, God tells him that it shouldn’t be so because, in fact, it is God who is building a house for David.

Such is our life. We plan, we think, we organize, and things may work well for a time. Then something happens and everything we have built crumbles. Behold, it is at this moment that God starts to build our house.

To be a Christian

To be a Christian is to cross frontiers, to be a citizen of the whole world. Each person is my brother or sister. Each place is my home.

Home

God is not against our happiness.
But it takes a lot of time, bumps, bruises and tears before we can say this, before we realize that what we thought would make us happy are merely passing thrills that leave us either disillusioned or longing for more.
Blessed are those who wake up from this stupor, when we realize that, all along, that elusive joy isn't elusive at all; that, deep in our hearts, it is what God wants that I truly want, because God only wants for me the fullness of joy.
I am home.

A parable for all

This coming Sunday's Gospel reading is from Luke 15:1-3, 11-32, famously entitled the Parable of the Prodigal Son. Here are some parts of a comment I found very interesting:

At different times in our lives, most of us have played each of these roles: that of the doting, loving, apparently overindulgent parent; that of the younger son who experiences being brought low by sinfulness and pride, and desperately in need of mercy; the older son, who is responsible and above reproach, and who is frustrated by the generosity and leniency with which the weaknesses and sins of others are dealt with.
This deeply moving parable highlights two of Luke's characteristic emphases: God's welcome of sinners and those considered socially and religiously unacceptable, and the rejoicing and celebration that are meant to accompany that welcome, that are meant to respond to the repentance that God invites.
The generous father of both sons welcomes back the youth who squandered his inheritance but does not repudiate the older son who protests the father's prodigality yet remains faithful to him. "Son, you are always with me, and all that is mine is yours" (v 31). The restoration of the son who "was dead and has come to life" who "was lost and has been found" (v 32), does not invalidate the fidelity of the older son. The younger son, restored to the father's household, must make a new beginning in the life of fidelity. Reconciled to God, both sons must work out together their reconciliation with each other.
Does the elder son finally make peace with his brother and welcome him back? Does he find it in his heart to forgive, and to share in the father's rejoicing? Or does he, in the final accounting, find himself even more alienated than his younger brother had been? Where is the mother in this story? What was her response? We are left hoping for a conclusion that Jesus never provides. That's what parables are all about: They invite us to enter into the story and to find the answers in our own lives and times.
The parable of "The Wayward Son" or "The Prodigal Father" or the "Indignant Elder Brother" can cause much grief for us, as we see ourselves and our motives exposed for what they really are. The prodigal Father squanders his own love on our pettiness, our meanness, our diffidence, and our arrogance.

Fr. Thomas Rosica, CSB

Longing for home

When we were younger we couldn't wait to go out to see the world and to spread our wings. But at a certain point in our life, we just experience that yearning to be cuddled, to be tucked in bed, to be offered a cup of hot chocolate and to be told that no matter what mess we have made of our life, we are still special to somebody. We long for home.