It is better to light just one little candle,
Than to stumble in the dark!
Better far that you light just one little candle,
All you need’s a tiny spark!

… if everyone lit just one lite candle,
What a bright world this would be!
What a bright world
This would be!
Joseph Maloy Roach

My friend loved to hate God.

It didn’t matter.

God laughed and had the last word.

Pardon us, please.

Before addressing Easter and the wonder of the Resurrection, we must speak to the Father of the Resurrection, the Son of Courage, and the Spirit of Hope.

“Sometimes, O Lord, you leave us shaking our heads…
At Your joy in playing with our emotions.
At Your timing.”

Way back when Miami was a much smaller city (and I couldn’t get away with anything because no matter where I went someone knew and reported to my folks) and the family home was getting too small, Mr. and Mrs. Flynn spent weeks searching for the “right lot” in the “right location.”

First (and for accuracy). Abraham Lincoln never said “You can fool all of the people some of the time and some of the people all of the time.”

“A foolish consistency
is the hobgoblin of little minds,
adored by little statesmen and philosophers
and divines.”
Ralph Waldo Emerson

Let’s get those signs.

I need one of those signs.

Because cowardly politicians are nudging me closer to the brink of hatred.

And I don’t want to go there.

At least I don’t want to go to hating someone.

It was 1970, my second year of seminary (actually “novitiate” – a post-university year of “pledging” for membership and first vows in Roman Catholic orders); we were assigned as parttime chaplains-in-training at Boston City Hospital.

Fine.

Almost - but not quite – great.

If “context is everything,” here’s context.

(This is one of those “strange but true and only in Miami” stories.) Once upon a time, the prelude to Sunday church services included disposing of animal carcasses – usually roosters, hens or pigeons – left at church doors during predawn hours.

A prayerfully-offered reflection for those who spew
and those who are buying the
“they’re replacing good Americans” and
“poisoning the blood”
bovine-digestive-process-by-product.

Bear with us, please.

Some stories for perspective.

Almost forty years later, Father Roger’s eyes close as the memory floods in. He was a fairly new priest when the call came: “Come to the hospital!” A young couple needed him.

Summon the pastor.

Call the minister.

Contact the rectory and ask for the priest to come.

Maybe even make “advanced preparations” with the caterer, the place for the “after-it-all” family reception; decide who will speak and in what order.

Because Michael Flynn doesn’t take down his Christmas decorations until Super Bowl weekend, we’ll take that as permission to extend the holiday season (and excuse our failure to send this week’s post to our webmaster on time for posting last week as an Epiphany gift). Nonetheless, we believe the message is especially important and are privileged to share it with you.

“There is a story about Clare Boothe Luce [1903-1987] complaining that
she was bored with hearing about the Holocaust.
A Jewish friend of hers said he perfectly understood
her sensitivity to the matter; in fact,
he had the same sense or repetitiveness and fatigue,
hearing about the crucifixion.”
Herbert Gold, Selfish Like Me

For more than thirty years, Father Skipper wrote short stories as his Christmas Eve Mass-gift for family and friends. In 2020 and through the kindness of Michael Keister and his family, the collection was published as A Toy Truck For A Marine And Other Christmas Tales From A Simple Missionary Priest.

For more than thirty years, Father Skipper wrote short stories as his Christmas Eve Mass-gift for family and friends. In 2020 and through the kindness of Michael Keister and his family, the collection was published as A Toy Truck For A Marine And Other Christmas Tales From A Simple Missionary Priest.

Every now and then, a high school or college professor will write an especially difficult exam beginning with “You will have one hour to complete this test. You must remain at your desk until the hour has ended. Read the entire exam carefully before beginning to write your answers.”

“Can a woman forget her nursing child,
that she should not have compassion on the son of her womb?
Yes, these may forget, yet I will not forget you!
Behold how much I love you,
I have engraved you on the palms of my hands!”
Isaiah 49:15-16

If only some “pastors” knew Latin.

If some “pastors” knew Latin, we’d hear them imploring:

Confiteor Deo omnipotenti… quia peccavi nimis cogitatione, verbo et opere: mea culpa, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa.

The story – told by one of my seminary professors – is probably apocryphal.

But it makes the point.