I once knew a couple who had been married for over seventy years. Some people would say, “They’ve been together so long, they even look like each other!” They came to Mass together every day, and I was always struck by the way they looked at one another. If one of them was speaking to me, the other was looking at the other with this glow of absolute affection. They were something else. They weren’t rich. They weren’t powerful. They were, however, in love. As old as they were, when you looked at them, you felt like they were still a couple of love-struck kids during their first week of dating. I am certain that in seventy years of marriage, that couple had its share of sorrows, hardships, and disappointments. Every life does. There was routine to their marriage. They got up and went to work, did laundry, and did all of the mundane activities that fill the hours of most of our lives. The ordinary did not suffocate their vocation. Instead, they lived the ordinary circumstances of life as an adventure. Sometimes, we think that the ordinary is the enemy of our happiness. People search for thrills to distract themselves from the ordinary. But, happiness is not found in fleeing the ordinary. It is discovered in living the ordinary differently. They lived the ordinary in a supernatural way. Every Sunday we come together for Mass. We are fairly ordinary people. We come together from our ordinary lives. We take ordinary bread and ordinary wine and place them upon the altar. In some sense, when the ordinary bread and the ordinary wine are placed upon the altar, we are also placing our ordinary selves–our ordinary lives–upon the altar too. The danger for us, however, is to allow ourselves to forget that what is happening is supernatural. That ordinary bread and wine are supernaturally transformed. We who receive the Eucharist are, in turn, transformed. The Eucharist transforms us and we, in turn, live our ordinary lives differently because we do not live on mere ordinary bread, but rather are nourished by and with God Himself. We who are changed are then sent into the world as seeds of the Kingdom. There’s a risk in Catholic life that instead of allowing the extraordinary to permeate the ordinary and elevate it, we attempt to make the extraordinary ordinary and cheapen it. If Mass, for example, becomes merely me “checking the box” of my religious duty this week, then something is lacking. If my approach to Mass is, “as long as it doesn’t interfere with the other things in my life, I’m okay with it,” something is missing. If I treat the Mass (and the Eucharist) like I am the customer and the parish is the service-provider, something is missing. Sometimes people allow their Catholic life to become rather functionary and transactional. It becomes stagnant. Think of what Jesus says in the gospel when he says, “What good is salt if it loses its flavor?” Much of our lives as Catholics does involve rather ordinary activity. When we come to Mass on Sunday, something extraordinary–something supernatural–occurs. Ordinary bread and wine become the Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity of Christ. And, we consume the Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity of Christ. We receive God. The more we take time to ponder our Faith, the more we come to know and appreciate the extraordinary gift of it. This is why preparing for Mass by silence, prayer, and meditation are so important. Before Mass, we prepare by saying things like, “Lord, I am here and am about to receive you–Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity. Jesus, help me to really know what I am doing and Who I am receiving. Help me unite myself to you in this Holy Mass. Help me to really pray this Mass well and to offer myself–every aspect of my life–with you to the Father.” After we receive Holy Communion, we spend time in awe and wonder that God loves us so much that He has given Himself to us in this spectacular way. The Christ who was born of Mary, the Christ who called and taught the apostles, who healed the sick, who forgave sinners, who died on the Cross, who rose from the Dead . . . that very same Christ has now given Himself entirely to me because He loves me. We take this time to thank Jesus for His love and for the privilege of this communion with Him. Without this Eucharistic amazement, our Catholic life risks becoming consumeristic and hollow. If you feel ever that you are in a rut or that your Faith life is not growing, that you are not growing in virtue, growing in greater love for God and for your neighbor, perhaps begin by spending time before each Mass really praying and pondering what is about to happen, and then, spend time after receiving the Eucharist really adoring God whom you have received. The most extraordinary moment of our week (or day) is when we receive the Eucharist. It enables us to live every ordinary moment in a supernatural way. That elderly couple looked at each other with a devotion and love that made them young in heart and their marriage seem both like an old treasure and a new discovery. That is how we want to approach the Eucharist, and that begins by spending time preparing to receive the Eucharist and in spending time thanking God for the gift of the Eucharist. Your Brother in Christ, Fr. David Barnes

Some years ago in a previous parish, I moved a crucifix that had hung for a century on a piece of beautiful fabric in the church sacristy. When I took down the crucifix, I was surprised to see the real color of the fabric. Decades of sunlight, heat, and incense had caused the surrounding fabric to fade, but behind the crucifix, the real rich color had been preserved. Sometimes when we go about our life we do not realize just how significantly we are affected by the culture around us. Like the fabric in that sacristy, the change is not always immediately perceptible. It is gradual. We live at a time when the culture around us has changed dramatically. Things that would have been universally condemned sixty (or even ten) years ago, are now widely accepted. Things that would have been universally acknowledged as good sixty (or even ten) years ago, might now be looked upon with suspicion or derision. (I should add that there are many wonderful things about the present culture that we should rejoice in, but today I am focused upon those things that erode our own humanity.) The disintegration of the family, the ubiquity of pornography, the presumption of cohabitation before marriage, the acceptance and promotion of abortion, and a host of other factors have left their mark on our culture. Similarly, the culture of, what I might call, harshness has become the new normal. Social media often makes people forget the humanity of others. People are told that they should be perpetually angry about everything. It affects the way that people communicate with one another. This harshness dehumanizes the person on the other end of the phone or on the receiving end of an email. In the midst of all of this, the Church remains steadfast in its defense of the human person. In our present moment, governments are opting to allow the killing of the sick. The Church stands in absolute opposition to this because Jesus tells us to visit and care for the sick, not eliminate them. It is a grotesque distortion to call the killing of the sick a form of mercy. The Catechism of the Catholic Church reminds us that:  “Scripture specifies the prohibition contained in the fifth commandment: ‘Do not slay the innocent and the righteous.’ The deliberate murder of an innocent person is gravely contrary to the dignity of the human being, to the golden rule, and to the holiness of the Creator. The law forbidding it is universally valid: it obliges each and everyone, always and everywhere.” In a culture where it is becoming increasingly acceptable to think that suicide and euthanasia are legitimate options, it is good for us to remember that the Fifth Commandment absolutely prohibits them. Those who suffer from physical ailments, old age, or from mental anguish must never be encouraged to think “it would be better for everyone else if I’m not here.” As Christians, we cherish human life and do not determine for ourselves which lives are worth living. Another topic I want to mention (and yes, I know it is a political third rail these days) is the issue of the treatment of people present in our country whose legal status is questionable. Every country has a right to establish and enforce laws that regulate immigration. Reasonable people may disagree on what those laws should entail and how they should be enforced. My purpose in writing here is not to impose on anyone else my opinions on how the immigration situation should be resolved in its specifics. Rather, I want simply to mention that in our culture, there can be a tendency to dehumanize immigrants. Many people who entered the country unlawfully did so to escape violence and poverty, and to make a better life for their families. I cannot help but think how terrifying it must be for a man or a woman who is raising a family to wonder if they will be suddenly arrested one day. In a culture that tends to demonize people and dehumanize them, Christians are called to love them and to promote their human dignity. When we are at Mass, none of us looks around and thinks, “I will love that family over there once I know their immigration status.” In the same way that none of us looks around and thinks, “I will love that family over there once I know if they’ve been completely honest each time they’ve filed their taxes.” We love them because they are made in the image and likeness of God and are our brothers and sisters in Christ. A Christian culture–when it saw human suffering–built orphanages, hospitals, adoption agencies, soup kitchens, mutual aid societies, St. Vincent dePaul Societies, homeless shelters and so on. In a culture where Christianity is fading, so is the dignity afforded to human life. We live at a moment when the unborn, the poor, the infirm, the immigrant etc. are often viewed as problems to be eradicated rather than human beings to be loved and protected. What can we do? We can live in the midst of our culture as disciples of Jesus Christ. We can place ourselves firmly in the shadow of His Cross. We can live as a sign of contradiction. In the midst of a culture that increasingly devalues human life and dignity, we can be true disciples of the Lord who radiate His love to all, especially to the vulnerable and the suffering. Decades of intense light, dirt, and heat eroded the brilliance of that piece of fabric, but behind the image of the Crucified Christ, its glory was preserved. At the moment, cultural forces can cause the brilliant dignity of human life to become less apparent. Without Christ, the world tends to become gray, cold, and harsh. It is only in Christ that the full dignity and beauty of life is truly discovered. The more we live in Christ and follow Him, the more we become in a faded world a sign of contradiction and a witness to hope. Your Brother in Christ, Fr. David Barnes