Merry SaintJohntheBaptistmas! “Wait? What did he say?” Read More
savior | Deacon Allen Tatara Catholic Speaker
On the Inside; On the Outside
Every time I hear the words from Exodus, “I AM WHO AM,” I can’t help myself to think about the words of Popeye the Sailor Man: “I am what I am.” Read More
I was sorting through a bunch of papers recently when I came upon a quote from a silent retreat that I had taken a number of years ago. Here is that quote:
What do you do when everything is going wrong and there’s nothing else you can do?
You hang on – just like Jesus did.
The imagery behind this quote was that of Jesus on the cross.
Jesus did everything that He could do in order to show people how they should live, how they should serve those in need, and how they should love everyone. Now, Jesus finds Himself heading towards His death – and there’s nothing more He can do about it, except hang on.
This is a beautiful, symbolic gesture of how we should accept the challenges that we face everyday. When we realize that things are out of our control and not going the way we had hoped, we just need to hang on. Things will eventually get better. (They always do!) After all, Jesus hung on in order to save us. And everything got better after that!
Jesus, give us the strength to hang on even when it seems impossible to do so. Let us feel your constant presence so that we may know that you are right here beside us, especially during our struggles. Free us from our burdens and lead us to the power of your saving love. We ask this through Christ our Lord. Amen.
The Witness of the Candymaker
How can a candy treat be a birth announcement? Many years ago a candymaker had an idea. He wanted to show, through the candy he made, that Jesus Christ was born among us, lived and died to save us all. So, through the use of color and shape, he created a piece of candy that told the story of Jesus from Christmas to Easter. He created the candy cane!
Color
The white stripes on the candy cane stand for the fact that Jesus was sinless and pure. The three small red stripes stand for the scourging Jesus endured before he died. The large red stripe stands for Jesus’ blood, shed on the cross.
Shape
The candy cane is shaped like a shepherd’s staff, reminding us that Jesus is the Good Shepherd. Turn it upside down, and it is the letter “J,” the first letter of Jesus’ name.
We can learn a lot from the candy cane – both to look at it and see Jesus, and, like the candymaker, to share the story of Jesus in whatever we do.
May the peace and joy of Christmas fill you, complete you, and overflow into everything you do and everyone you meet.
Merry Christmas!
We are Emmanuelites…God is with us!
We used this call and response in Youth Ministry many years ago. And it had two purposes: first, to gain the attention of the teens so they could focus on what was about to happen. And second, to remind them to trust in the fact that God is with us at all times.
We are Emmanuelites…God is with us! Read More
Most of us can remember being told to ‘wake up’ when we were growing up. Maybe the words came from one of our parents after we tried to catch a few extra minutes of sleep on a school day. Maybe it was in the classroom when we discovered that not only did we not know the answer to a teacher’s question but we didn’t even hear the question! For many of us, waking up is hard to do!
In the next four weeks, the Church invites us to enter into the longing of those who first waited for the coming of the Messiah. Scripture helps us to do this through the figures of Isaiah, John the Baptist and Mary. Advent also directs our minds and hearts to await Christ’s second coming at the end of time, spoken of in Matthew’s Gospel (MT 24:37-44): stay awake, for you do not know on what day your Lord will come. Advent is a time to wake up to God’s love, and to realize more fully that God wants us to love one another as God loves us – unconditionally. It is a time, especially, to renew our hearts in and through love; for the best way for us to prepare to remember the celebration of God’s coming among us in Jesus is through a conversion of our hearts.
It’s time for us to wake up! Advent invites us to wake up to something wonderful, to some good news – and that news is this: Jesus is coming! Let us prepare ourselves to receive him.
