Thursday, March 30, 2017

Blessed Assurance

Baxter has taken on a new routine. In the morning, after he has had breakfast, a few drinks at the spigot, and some litter box relief, he usually is planning on his nap. However, recently Baxter has added one more stop on his way to drifting off to sleep. He jumps on my lap, purring his heart out, and he wants to be petted and rest for a few minutes before going to his bed. At first, I couldn’t figure out the reason for this detour onto me. He used to just ignore me after his morning routine until he wanted something else to eat or drink. What’s with the cuddles, up close and personal? I came to figure it out.

Blessed assurance! Baxter needed a pat on the head, a rub under the chin and some quiet lap time to relax before he went to sleep. In his later years, he needs to know that we are ok, that I am there to take care of him and that he won’t be left alone to fend for himself. Baxter needs a boost in our trust so that he’s selfconfident as a cat again.

We are often in the same situation. Things change in us, around us, and among us, and we need to know where we stand with each other. We may not be able to do what we once were capable of doing. We may have a different schedule with more demands on our time. We may be physically weaker or emotionally distraught or both. We may have different demands placed on us at work or at home, and we are unsure of ourselves with these responsibilities. Whatever the reason, we need some reassurance that the anchors in our lives remain secure while other things may be changing.

God is our first anchor. When things get rocky, go to Him in prayer and worship. Listen to His divine message of faithful love and unending grace to face whatever life brings. Allow God in on your anxieties, lack of confidence, mistakes and failures, and He will place these into perspective. We are not alone. God walks with us through life’s changes to bolster our selfconfidence and show us how to persevere. Look for Him in the new circumstances we all face from time to time.

Those persons who love us are our second anchor. When circumstances change and challenge us, true love rises to the occasion with help and support, with encouragement and patience, with loyalty and sacrifices. With God as our shared foundation, we stand together through tough times. Sometimes we share the burdens; sometimes we challenge each other to rise to the new occasion and meet its demands. In all of this, we become the face of Jesus for each other, a sign that the first anchor is real and there for us all.

Baxter isn’t bashful about what he needs to carry on. We shouldn’t be either.

-Monsignor Statnick

Wednesday, March 15, 2017

Nothing Changes, But...

When the time sprung ahead last Sunday, I didn’t change anything with Baxter’s feeder. I was too lazy to go through all the steps of resetting the clock and the meal times. I figured he would just continue his usual routine with the same interval of time between meals. Of course, the world beyond Baxter’s feeder was operating a little differently. I was awake when his breakfast began now whereas in standard time I slept through it. But what should this matter to Baxter? The food is the same, in the same amount, offered at the same time for his biological clock. But that wasn’t good enough for him.

Since I am around now when he is waiting for his breakfast, Baxter wouldn’t allow me to proceed with my morning chores. He kept trying to intervene with my tasks, so that I would drop everything and get him his food. Even though everything was on the same time for his appetite, the setting had changed, and that mattered a lot to him. Why didn’t I pay attention to his needs now and focus on his hunger? While for six months of the year he is content to wait for his breakfast, now he has someone who could make an exception for him and stroke his ego. He wanted my attention, and he wasn’t happy when I didn’t give it to him.

We act that way sometimes as well. Nothing has really changed in the situation we find ourselves, but we want to get our way by gaining attention. We want to be made an exception and feel that we are special because of it. We think our needs should take priority over others, and we don’t like to have to fit into a standard procedure and policy. Especially when we have an audience to look and listen, we like to perform, to make a drama of our problems and concerns, and gain the attention of the moment. We like to be the star in our own play.

But God puts us in our place. There is no question that He loves us and is present to us at every moment. However, God will not dote on us, cater to our tantrums, or give into our egotistic demands. Instead, He reminds us to take our turns, play by the rules, and consider others as we go about our business. God calls us out of ourselves to take in the larger setting and the concerns it holds.

Daylight saving time allows us to enjoy an evening lit by the sun rather than our artificial light. God’s light shows us genuine needs and problems to be addressed, and exposes the false problems we create for ourselves from our selfishness. Baxter will survive the transition in time and eventually adjust to the new setting. Will we learn to live in God’s light and follow the Way it shows us, the way of Jesus, the Servant and Savior of us all?

Thursday, March 9, 2017

Stubborn In Our Ways

Sometimes Baxter won’t listen. That usually happens when he either becomes impatient about something he wants or doesn’t want to hear that he can’t have what he wants. If he wants a drink from the spigot, Baxter cries from the tub. If I don’t respond immediately, he stands there and continues to cry unceasingly. He usually wins, unless I can get out of earshot of his racket. Begging from the table is another matter. If Baxter picks up the scent of some delicacy that delights his palette, he becomes very forceful in trying to get it. He will jump on the chair next to mine and pull at my arm to get a piece. If that doesn’t work, he will try to get on the table and nose his way to my plate. At that point, my voice gets stern with him and I quickly place him back on his chair. He settles down for a while until he can figure out how to launch another move for my food. Baxter can get stubborn about getting what he wants. He wants it NOW, and he wants it even if it isn’t good for him.

We can get that way too. We set our sights on something, and we don’t quit until we get it, and preferably as soon as possible. We get trapped by our desires. They begin to consume our lives. They take all our time and energy. They dominate how we relate to each other. They become the only thing we take into consideration when making decisions. That car, that house, that job, that relationship, or maybe just that way of doing something-I got to have whatever it is I want, and nothing will get in my way. This is the classic condition of the addict, but it sometimes marks all of our lives from time to time.

Lent is a time to free ourselves of the desires that weigh us down and keep us from wanting better things for ourselves. Prayer, fasting and almsgiving are meant to change what drives us day to day. In raising our minds and hearts to God in a personal and mutual relationship, prayer is trying to show us something better to want. In consistently eating or drinking a little less, we shrink our appetite to taste more of what we do imbibe and appreciate it more. In sharing what we have, we realize what we have been given and grow in our thanks for life’s blessings.

In time, these disciplines cause us to be less driven but more satisfied. We move from quantity to quality. Less becomes more, because what we desire more and more we can’t buy or steal. We can only receive and accept it. Instead of feeding our appetites for various physical or psychological pleasures, we feed our souls with the food of happiness—genuine love, the taste of beauty and goodness, and gratitude for the richness of human life. These are God’s gifts.

Baxter’s life is driven by his basic instincts, and once he is hooked on something, he can’t see anything else. We are called to higher things, the things of God. His love makes us hungry for more, more of what makes life meaningful and full. Lent is the season when we tame our desires into Christian virtues that make us and our world better.

Moving Waters

As you know by now, Baxter likes to drink from a spigot. However, it is not so much the spigot, as the fact that the water coming from a spigot is moving and splashing. He doesn’t like calm ponds. He wants moving waters where the surface tension is broken and the waves or ripples show that something is happening here. In fact, Baxter is so intent on drinking only moving water that when he goes to his water bowl for a drink, he first pushes it around with this paw until he gets the required wave action worthy of his drink. As far as he is concerned, still water won’t satisfy his thirst, and he has to get it flowing before drinking it looks attractive.

God has the same attitude about the waters of baptism. Did you ever think about the fact that we can’t baptize someone in a still pool? The very act of baptism moves the waters and splashes them about. The waters stir when we baptize and the person who is baptized gets wet. We don’t enter the life of Christ neat and perfect looking. We come from the font with messy hair, maybe a little shaken by the shock of the cold water, and relying upon our family and friends to put us back together again. The ritual of baptizing physically disturbs us. And that’s the point.

The waters of life are living and moving. They engulf us when we enter into them, and they make us like them. They soak into us and change our demeanor and way of acting. They force us to move about because they change our body temperature and feel. They communicate a dynamic energy that disrupts our usual metabolism and can even cause us for a moment to gasp for breath. They grab our attention, and we can’t ignore the difference they make on us.

Lent is meant to renew this energy of baptism in us. Too often we drift into a stagnant pool of faith where we are warm and comfortable with our way of life. Lent stirs the waters around us to get us moving. Prayer, fasting and almsgiving are paddles used to disturb the surface so that we can move through the waters with God’s lead. We are invited to dive more deeply into the meaning of our baptism. Being baptized is not just a status in the church opening us to the privilege of receiving the other sacraments. It is a call to become someone: to become a disciple in close relationship with Jesus; to become a minister who seeks to serve others and not just one’s self; to become a witness to the meaning that comes to life when touched by God’s abundant love and forgiveness.

So splash about a bit more this Lent when you think about repentance and renewal. Stagnant water breeds disease, but flowing waters cleanse and purify. Baxter is on to something with his quirky drinking habits. God is onto something bigger when He invites us into His life through baptism.