Seeking Wisdom

I think sometimes we need to step back and be thankful for the problems we have. First, this requires an acknowledgment of the fact that we’ll always have an issue. We, with our optimizing, problem-solving brains will always find some facet of our life that could be improved in some way, so let’s not be too hasty to solve our problems in thinking that then we will finally be happy and our life will be perfect. This is not exactly the same but it is a similar concept as the hedonistic treadmill. Second is to assess what kind of problems we are facing, what are our dilemmas. The problem I’m thinking of today is a decision. It is a decision between two good things, whether to continue with football or go in for daily mass, bodybuilding, music, and rugby with the time I would have spent on football. No doubt the decision has given me considerable distress, but I find solace when I remember what I am choosing between. Something that will make me happy and enrich my life, and somet...

Link to Daily Readings “Lord you know everything, you know that I love you.” That Gospel reading is very emotionally powerful to me. I think it’s dry for few people who are really listening to it. The Lord God asks for confirmation twice that his disciple truly loves him. In this he gives Peter the chance to redeem himself for his denial of Christ during the time of the Passion. In this passage we see again the dying and rebirth pattern found throughout the Gospel and most religions. Perhaps the reason I’m seeing this in this passage is that I was just reading about that pattern yesterday in Lewis’s Miracles . During the Passion we see the early Church crushed and scattered. Its most belligerent and dedicated leader, the one who drew his sword and struck off someone’s ear to defend Jesus, has been reduced to denying the Christ three times in one night out of fear. It would seem the whole thing is unraveling. The Messiah will be killed, and the Church is not strong enough...

Link to Daily Readings “by their fruits you will know them.” A good tree cannot put forth bad fruit, and a bad tree cannot put forth good fruit. It reminds me of something I heard while watching the Netflix show Bojack Horseman . At one point Diane, who is probably the deepest thinking character on the show, is asked by Bojack if she believes he is, deep down, a good person. She responds that she doesn’t think there is a deep down, that she’s come to think that we are what we do. I think this can sound pretty damning to people who’ve had a run of bad behavior recently but it really should be quite an encouragement. If our interior nature is evidenced by, and caused by, our exterior nature we should have nothing to fear, because we can control our actions. How much more terrifying would it have been if Jesus had said, sometimes good trees have bad fruit, and sometimes a bad tree will give good fruit for a long time, but it will always be a bad tree. I think this passage is...

I think looking at the daily readings, even if we can’t take the time to go to daily Mass, is a great way to stay involved in our faith life. It takes five minutes, with a smartphone you can do it anywhere. I set it up as an email from USCCB so I even get a notification reminding me to do it. I usually read them during the time I would be wasting anyways. If I’m eating breakfast alone and I’d otherwise be reading the news or scrolling through some social media site filled with things I’m not interested in I'll look at the readings. I actually got into the habit by doing it during my morning trip to the toilet. Which may seem pretty funny, I think it is (six-year-old humor), but I think it’s fitting as well. As the scriptures say there is a season for every activity under Heaven; I think this could be extended to mean that anything we’re biologically constrained to do must be able to be done in a holy way. It may not be terribly important, it may not lead to any great insights...

6 – 27 – 17 Link to Daily Readings “all the land that you see I will give to you and your descendants forever.” God has great plans for us. Far greater than we could imagine for ourselves, and I suspect in most cases somewhat greater than we want for ourselves. Indeed I think many of us are not scared off from faith because it is boring, but because it is intimidating. Consider what would happen if we really dedicated our existence to following God’s will. Imagine the chances we’d have to take, the risks we’d endure. I find the possibility far more exciting than any Marvel movie, and its converse is deathly boring. To be wicked, not necessarily a criminal, is a very simple thing to do. It is almost always easy to predict what the selfish person will do. It is neither very gratifying, for there are never any testing moments, never any triumphs of spirit. One’s end goal is the material comforts and pleasures of this world, which are only satisfying in their moment and m...

6 – 24 – 17 Link to Daily Readings “I praise you, for I am wonderfully made.” I think it’s quite often that we forget to be thankful. I think it is nearly every moment of my life that I am not thankful, but our culture is not supportive of this either. From a commercialism standpoint people who are satisfied with what they have are terrible customers. But in this case I’m speaking not of thankfulness for material things, situations, or even relationships. I am speaking of thankfulness for our own being, for all the ways that we ourselves are truly extraordinary. I think even people who frequently take time to thank God don’t commonly say things like “Thank you Lord for the outstanding mind you have given me.” I think pride factors into this fact in several ways. Firstly, those who are thankful for what God has given them try to steer themselves away from pride. It is not hard to see how appreciating the good things of yourself can lead to pride. I think, however, that i...

6 – 23 – 17 Link to Daily Readings This passage contains Jesus proclaiming that He is the only path to the Father, that He is the only method of salvation for all human souls. There probably couldn’t be a more important thing in the universe. In this passage He also says, “I am meek and humble of heart.” Which seems like quite the contradiction when we consider these two ideas together, but we are thinking of our human experience. Jesus does not need to boast, firstly it would not be in his nature, secondly there is nothing he would desire to lay claim to being that He is not. In this passage He is simply telling his disciples about the nature of His ministry, expressing to them the importance of not only Himself, but his teachings. I think this distinction is what makes these statements feel contradictory to each other when they in fact are not. Most other times we have heard someone boast on that level, of being all-powerful or the very, very best at something it is eit...

I listened to an Art of Manliness podcast this morning that I really enjoyed [ Link to Podcast on Soundcloud (52 minutes) ]. Brett interviewed Ron Chernow, the author of Hamilton , the biography that inspired the Lin-Manuel Miranda musical, about his new book Grant . It was very interesting, and inspiring to me, to hear about Grant’s heroics, precisely because he’s not typically presented as much of a hero. He’s widely portrayed as a drunkard, which is somewhat fair, and a butcher, less fair, yet he showcased some incredibly strong personality traits throughout his life. His courage in the Mexican-American war, as exemplified by the story of him riding on the side of his horse to go fetch ammunition, was a precursor to the action in his life that really struck me and won me over. I think most people know Grant died penniless, what I didn’t know was that this was because of a Ponzi scheme, a continuation of Grant’s ill fortune in financial matters. Shortly after losing his mon...

Link to Daily Readings There’s a cheeky expression I often use in my personal life, especially with Emilia, that I feel also has some theological connection to it. Often, when we disagree about something unimportant like whether marmalade or jam is the better spread I’ll say to her, “It’s okay to be wrong dear.” I’m not sure where I picked it up, but it sounds like something you might hear in a classroom as a teacher encourages their students to raise their hands to answer a question. But I think we should take this as a mantra in our spiritual lives as well. It’s okay to not have a perfect understanding of how one being could be three persons. It’s okay to not have the Gospel of Luke memorized and it’s okay to be unaware of Catholic social doctrine. A quick disclaimer however, the reason for the unknowing in all these cases is ignorance or lack of what would be an impressive effort. We are responsible for educating ourselves to the best of our ability, but that does not mean we...