This weekend, we will celebrate the Sacrament of Anointing at all Masses this weekend. We encourage all parishioners who may need spiritual and physical healing to come forward right after the homily to receive this anointing and prayers from the community. We also ask you to invite any Catholic neighbor or friend who is in need as well. We will come together as a community to seek Our Lady of Lourdes’ intercession and the grace of God as we offer our prayers and support to those facing illness and suffering in our midst.
This coming Wednesday we begin our Lenten journey with Ash Wednesday. It is very early this year, and it falls on Valentine’s Day. What a happy coincidence! Valentine’s Day is all about romantic love we share with others and Lent is about the deep love God has for all of us. The journey of Lent lasts only 40 days but can carry us for the rest of the year if we could journey to true conversion. This year we have chosen the theme “Seeing With the Eyes of the Heart: A Journey to Easter.”
It is my hope that we will try our hardest to start some “tiny habits” of praying, fasting and almsgiving for this journey. I encourage us to see these 40 days not so much as a time to “give up something” and “become better,” as much as to try to “do a new action” and “see all things and people differently.” What I mean by that is to really open our hearts to the Lord and allow him to open our eyes of our hearts to wonder and awe—to let the mystery of God’s love unfold before our very eyes with freshness and vitality. To help on your Lenten journey, we will be distributing little “heart-shaped stones” on Ash Wednesday to remind us of our commitment of seeing with the heart. Please come to Mass on Ash Wednesday at 6:30am, 8:30am or 7:00pm and pick up your beautiful stone and start your journey to Easter. Women’s Spirituality meets on Wednesday at 10:00 – 11:00am in the Chapel and our Stations of the Cross with Soup Suppers begin on Friday, February 16th at 6:00pm. More information on our Lenten programs and events are on our website here.
I am reading a book by Dacher Keltner, The Power of Awe, and he defines awe as “the emotion that arises when we encounter vast mysteries that transcend our understanding of the world. Awe opens our minds to the truth that we as individuals are part of something much larger than self. … The most universal source of awe, our research finds, is the moral beauty of others, when we are moved and touched by others’ kindness, courage, and ability to overcome adversity. … Awe can reduce stress, loneliness, and physical distress, and bring one a sense of expanded time, perspective, and connection.”
It is my firm conviction that if we can open the eyes of our hearts we will be moved by the moral beauty of others’ kindness, love and courage and then be inspired to replicate it because our “mirror neurons” have been activated in our brain. We know that healthy brains are wired for empathy and if we can really “see” others then we will be moved by their beauty and awe.
To help us on this journey of renewal, we have invited former President of Santa Clara University, Fr. Kevin O’Brien, S.J. to lead us on a 3-night retreat, March 4th-6th, 7:00pm – 8:15pm and share with us his insights from his latest book, Seeing With The Heart. It will be a spirit-filled time to open our eyes to God’s love and wonder.
To help prepare us for this time of retreat, I will lead two nights diving into the practice of the four levels of prayer that I gave last year in the Parish Retreat—simplicity, complexity, perplexity, harmony. Hopefully these nights will ready our hearts for the deeper challenges that Fr. Kevin will give the following week. These will take place on Tuesday, February 20th and 27th, 7:00pm – 8:00 pm. We will livestream for those not able to make it in person. On February 20th, I will go over Levels 1 & 2: Simplicity and Complexity and give examples of how to pray these levels with ease and grace. Then on February 27th, I will walk through several ways to pray at Levels 3 & 4—Perplexity & Harmony. Hopefully we can practice some of these at home and we can dialogue about our experiences and make this into a tutorial style workshops or practicums.
Last week when I was visiting the students in their classrooms, one of the eighth graders asked me, What was my favorite prayer and why? And why are there different levels of prayer? Wow! Great questions! That meant he had been listening to my levels of prayer description and was interested in learning.
I responded that my favorite was “no words prayer, just silent presence before God because it feels awesome to feel loved and not need words to express my love for God.” Then I explained the levels of prayer through a metaphor by comparing it to playing basketball. The student is an excellent basketball player, and I knew it would get his attention.
There are different levels of playing basketball. On one hand there are my very basic skills. I can throw the ball at the net and sometimes get it in. I can dribble the ball modestly but only well with my right hand. I never learnt how to play basketball, and nobody ever taught me the rules or how to get better. I am a level 1 at best, or maybe a level 0.5 mostly! On the other hand, this student can dribble with both hands and behind his back and between his legs without even looking. He can do layups with either hand or reverse layups as equally proficiently. He is well able to hit the net from anywhere and regularly hits 3-pointers when he is on! He is definitely a level 3 and maybe even a level 4 at times.
To say that we both play basketball is true but, he is many levels above me in skills and his practice schedule reflects his commitment to growing his skill level. I never play basketball nor practice. I will never get any better until I decide to learn some new skills and then commit to practicing those skills. I can admire the student all I want but I will not become like him until I practice my basketball playing skills.
In the same way, we can admire the saints and other people for their prayer skills but until we learn some new skills in prayer and practice at them, we will never advance in our prayer levels. The retreat nights I will lead will be like practice nights for prayer in a tutorial style!
You might say, that sounds like a lot of work – why would I bother? My response is this: I agree that prayer will not necessarily change God or indeed our life, but it will change us. And let’s face it, we could all do with a little change in our lives. It will change us in ways that will enable us to take all of lives’ struggles and joys and integrate them into a seamless garment of awe and wonder where we will see the beautiful, the true and the good in all of life and not just when things are going well for us. In other words, we will see with the eyes of our heart that God has made us in his own image.
Please come and join us for a wonderful journey this Lent and commit to tiny new habits of prayer. May we all practice a little and learn some new skills. For more information on Lent 2024 at St. Simon, visit our website here.
God bless,
Fr. Brendan