Carla Mae's Blog

 As women and men of the Word we have been reflecting on what Pope Francis has said about hope in our lives. What faces us in the coming weeks is no exception. The stakes are high, and at such times, Satan often struts around as an angel of light. Dominicans above all cannot allow themselves to be duped at a time like this.  It seems the media is presenting us with the news that some priests are telling their people that Catholics will sin mortally if they vote for pro-choice candidates. Sadly, these misinformed clergy are using their influence to misguide, and have not read or heeded the directives of their own bishops. These directives are found on the USCCB website. If you don’t have time to read the entire Voter’s Guide, check out #7 and #35. The latter was drawn from a principle given by Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger (formerly Pope Benedict XVI) which is important enough to quote in full: A Catholic would be guilty of formal cooperation in evil, and so unworthy to present...

We’re into the seventh month with no end in sight. It’s hard to believe we’ve been living with this virus for six months. But those are the facts. We wonder when it’s going to end. Liturgically we are at that mid - point between the events of the Great Paschal Mystery and Advent. It’s the time of the Feast of the Exaltation of the Cross, and right alongside, several feasts of Mary, the Mother of God: her Birthday on September 8; her name’s day on the 12 th , her sorrows on the 15 th and that ancient feast of Our Lady of Ransom on the 24th .  What is this Great Mother we call the Church thinking? First of all, who on earth wants to exalt the cross, that instrum ent of torture? And then, what does this humble woman have to do with the cross? I think a lot. Mary is always ourselves – fast forwarded. Yes, she is what we shall be after struggling through the agony and darkness of faith. She is us...come to fullness aft er hanging on for dear life by our fingernails. She stands there......

  Sometimes what surrounds us in the News gets so heavy we are seriously tempted to despair of things ever getting any better. We all know this space. Yet Pope Francis stands there with us, but calls us to look elsewhere. All of us live in this present world, and it is broken, wounded, corrupted, abused, and blind. Not a happy picture. This is real. But something else is real too. The more permanent reality is the content of our hope. We are talking about real stuff here, not just pie-in-the-sky. By stuff I mean tangible realities all around us that give substance to our hope. Deepest of all are the promises of our God, that life comes out of death, and that there will be a new creation. God does not lie. Yet we say, we must wait for the future for these to be fulfilled, right? Right maybe that they be fulfilled in their fullness, but in the meantime, we simply need to open our eyes. What are the signs of the content of our hope already at work right now? Let’s sta...

We all know we aren’t supposed to boast. Pope Francis reminds us that boasting usually makes us quite obnoxious to those around us. Yet there is one exception: we can boast all we want about the steadfastness of our hope. In fact, sometimes we need to do this when things look pretty grim.  Without blinking an eye we can boast about how every corner of our life is permeated with grace…no matter how we feel. This realization can fill us with gratitude and quiet joy. This can bring us deep peace and with that peace comes freedom. Why so? The steadfastness of hope gives us an assurance that nothing can take away. This gives us a wonderful freedom. Nothing we do or don’t do can change this steady hope. It doesn’t come from us and we can’t turn it off. It is God’s assurance, and it is as steady as a rock. So we smile a little knowing smile, and whistle as we pass the cemetery.  A sure and fast way to remind ourselves of this faith-fact is to ask ourselves: “Does God love me...

August comes, the August of the 2020 Pandemic. Liturgically, wise Mother-Church keeps before us during this month the brilliance of the Paschal promise: as your Lord and Lady have been transformed and shine now as the sun, so shall it be with you. In the Word, fused forever to our humble flesh, we have that pledge.  The feasts of the Transfiguration and Assumption of Mary bring this pledge before our eyes. The brilliance of the transformed Jesus stuns Peter, James, and John. They don’t know what to make of it. They only know they don’t want it to end. But it does end. There is the agony of the Passion to go through, but they don’t understand that either. Nor do we. Yet the pledge is the same. It is an assured hope given us by God, and where the Head went the Body will follow. That’s us.  Then, as if to underline the pledge, we watch it happen to one of our own. Mary has no burial place, because there is nothing in the tomb where they placed her. The body that held the Wo...

The great feasts are over…Easter, Ascension, Pentecost, Trinity, Corpus Christ. Liturgically it’s a bit like Fourth of July when the fireworks disappear from the night sky. We enter Ordinary Time. Lush green appears on our vestments, and in our summer fields. It’s the growing time in the North Temperate Zone. Summer is here and the fields are lush with new life. Truly, this mirrors our grace-lives liturgically. All the wonders of an unspeakable love have been shown to us, and now it is quiet. In the fields of our hearts much unseen will be going on. The texts will be calling forth growth from the great Mysteries. New life, new growth, new challenges to our cranky old ego with its blaming-shaming-complaining-whining-worrying-withdrawing ways. Oh, yes…our egoism has a voice. We can listen for it. Three ugly sisters, and three feverish brothers. They need to be put to ‘bed’ and get a good long healing ‘sleep.’ In their place we welcome joy, cultivate constant pray...

St. Augustine (in the Office of Readings) reminds us that there are two ‘times’ during the Liturgical Year: the time before Easter and the time after Easter. These two times reflect the ‘Paschal Mystery’ in our lives. The time before Easter is a time of struggle and penance in faith; the time after Easter is a time of unbounded joy and hope in the promise of our future. So now we have celebrated the ‘big’ feasts. The Lord has risen and ascended, taking our humble transformed humanness with him to the throne of his Father. They have sent their common Spirit-Gift. The Spirit now dwells and burns like a holy Fire in the midst of the Church. What has Jesus been teaching them - and us - during this precious ‘time after Easter?’ He has been teaching us ‘Now you see me, now you don’t.’ He appears when they are together, especially at meals. Then he is gone, breaking the pattern of his former time with them. In former times he was always visible to them. Now he isn’t. So – he is ...