still

Walking with Jesus will help us to experience the joy of the Father and the Holy Spirit.

“All things have been handed over to me by my Father. No one knows who the Son is except the Father, and who the Father is except the Son and anyone to whom the Son wishes to reveal him” (Lk 10:22).

God the Father knows God the Son and God the Son knows God the Father. They do not just know about each other, they know each other with a deep intimacy that is far beyond our human comprehension. Contemplating this reality can fill us with hope especially when we come to realize that Jesus is the Son of God who has come into our lives so that we can participate in the trinitarian communion of the Father and the Son and the love shared between them, who Jesus “rejoiced in” (Lk 10:21), the Holy Spirit!

Jesus has come as an agent of reconciliation, to restore our relationship with God, to undo the effects of the sin of separation that has so ruptured and wounded our relationship with him, each other, and his creation. Our hope this Advent is that we can come not just to a better understanding of God, but to restore our relationship with God and grow in intimacy with him through our participation in the life of his Son. Doing so, will also help us to do the same in our present relationships. Healing can happen when each of us are open to the Holy Spirit.

May the Advent season not get away from us before it even starts because of the external distractions from the material, commercial, and everyday busyness, nor from the everyday internal mental and psychological challenges that threaten. Choosing to be still, to breathe deep, and spend some time in God’s gift of creation, to enter into his natural rhythm, and bask in the wonder and vast expanse of it all can help us to step away from the distractions for even a little bit. In those moments we can find rest, reset, and react less. Reacting less helps relationships to heal.

I have done a lot of traveling in my life, but wherever I have gone, spending a year in the Bronx, six months in Los Angeles, a summer on the Pine Ridge and Rosebud Reservations, growing up and living in Connecticut for my first thirty years, or the last thirty years here in Florida, I have sought to spend time looking up at the sky. When I allow days to pass and I do not do so, I feel different and not for the better.

All of creation echoes the wonder and adoration of the gift that the season of Advent offers: Jesus, who became one with us in our humanity so we can become one with him in his divinity, invites us to participate in a deeper walk with his Father, the creator of heaven and earth, the one who knit us together in our mother’s womb, and who knows us better than we know ourselves! Please spend some time with God today in quiet reflection and allow him to love you where you are and as you are and rejoice in the Holy Spirit! Then share that joy with those in your lives.

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Photo: Walking on the way to our church hall for a meeting, turned back, and looked up. Wow. God is so good!

Link for the Mass readings for Tuesday, December 2, 2025

God cares more than we think.

In the Gospel, Jesus receives the seventy-two he had commissioned to heal and exorcize demons in his name. They returned rejoicing at the wonders that they experienced in their service and Jesus invited them to see that what was more amazing was not so much that “the spirits are subject to you, but rejoice because your names are written in heaven” (Luke 10:20).

What is amazing about what Jesus is sharing is that much more than what we do, even in doing God’s will, is who we are in relationship with God. That are names are written in heaven means, we know God. God cares about us personally and intimately. God knows each of us by name and knows us better than we know ourselves. Even though God does not need us, God yearns for relationship with us and has planted that very desire to be in relationship with him in the very depths of our minds, hearts, and souls. God also wants us to participate in his plan of salvation history and has a particular part for us to play.

When we give ourselves some time to take this in, to rest and stop, to breathe, really take some deep and slow breaths, and ponder not only how much God loves us, but actually give ourselves time to rest in and receive his love. Wow! You’ll never breathe or see the world in the same way again. When we receive something negative or harmful we are able to process and receive that in three seconds. To receive something good or to hear someone say we are loved, can take from 30 – 90 seconds to process.

We might hesitate or question whether God cares because we might believe that he allowed something to happen or not to happen, or because we are unwittingly welcoming the negative influence and lies of the enemy, such as: we may not care about having our name written in heaven; for what’s the point of having an eternal relationship with someone who doesn’t care enough to listen. Lies such as these keep God at a distance. But God hears all our prayers even while they are still thoughts in our mind.

He knows our deepest needs, hurts, and desires more than we do. To experience God’s love though, to know that he hears our prayers, we need to slow down and be still. God speaks in the silence of our hearts and we can hear his voice of love when we remain still long enough to hear, receive, and rest in his word.

Just taking a moment to be still, and to bring our questions to God is a good first step. For God is the best one to answer them. We just need to be prepared that he may answer our question with more questions. As long as we enter into the conversation, God will happen. It is not so much that we need to get up and do something, as much as instead, we need to sit and allow God to do something in us, and to remain still long enough to hear, receive, and rest in the gift of God’s love that he wants to share with us. Then, once have received what he has given and guided us to share, we do so.

Photo: “Be still, and know that I am God.” – Psalm 46:10

Link for the Mass readings for Saturday, October 4, 2025