Author Archives: Friar Musings

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About Friar Musings

Franciscan friar and Catholic priest at St. Francis of Assisi in Triangle, VA

Love and the Missionary Imperative

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This coming Sunday is the 5th Sunday of Easter in Liturgical Year C. The gospel is taken from John 13:31-35. Previously This love command seems to focus on relations within the new community rather than toward outsiders, a focus that has led many to view John as a narrow sectarian with no concern for outsiders. Such a view, however, misses the larger picture. John is quite clear that this divine love, in which the disciples are to share, is for the whole world (3:16; 4:42; 17:9). Indeed, their love for one another is part of God’s missionary strategy, for such love is an essential part of the unity they are to share with one another and with God; it is by this oneness of the disciples in the Father and the Son that the world will believe that the Father sent the Son (17:21). Jesus’ attention here in the farewell discourse, as well as John’s attention in his epistles, is on the crucial stage of promoting the love between disciples. The community is to continue to manifest God as Jesus has done, thereby shining as a light that continues to bring salvation and condemnation (cf. chaps. 15-16). Without this love their message of what God has done in Christ would be hollow.

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Voyager

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NASA launched the Voyager 1 Spacecraft in Sept 1977. It is now 15 billion miles from Earth and still sending data. Voyager 1 owns the distinction of being the first spacecraft to travel beyond the solar system and reach interstellar space – doing so in 2012. It is currently zipping through space at around 38,000 mph (17 kilometers per second), according to NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory. That’s Washington DC to Los Angeles in 3.6 minutes

The Voyager missions took advantage of a special alignment of the outer planets that happens just once every 176 years. This alignment allows spacecraft to gravitationally “slingshot” from one planet to the next, making the most efficient use of their limited fuel. Recognizing that the Voyagers would eventually fly to interstellar space, NASA authorized the production of two Golden Records to be placed on board the spacecraft. Sounds ranging from whale calls to the music of Chuck Berry were placed on board, as well as spoken greetings in 55 languages.

Voyager 1 was the first (there is also a Voyager 2 spacecraft) to race by Jupiter and Saturn. The images Voyager 1 sent back have been used in schoolbooks and by many media outlets for a generation. To NASA’s surprise, in March 1979 Voyager 1 spotted a thin ring circling Jupiter planet. It found two new moons as well — Thebe and Metis. Additionally, Voyager 1 sent back detailed pictures of Jupiter’s big Galilean moons (Io, Europa, Ganymede and Callisto) as well as Amalthea…. at this point you might be asking how many moons Jupiter has… 80 discovered so far.

Like the Pioneer spacecraft before it, Voyager’s look at Jupiter’s moons revealed them to be active worlds of their own. And Voyager 1 made some intriguing discoveries about these natural satellites. For example, Io’s many volcanoes and mottled yellow-brown-orange surface showed that, like planets, moons can have active interiors. Additionally, Voyager 1 sent back photos of Europa showing a relatively smooth surface broken up by lines, hinting at ice and maybe even an ocean underneath. (Subsequent observations and analyses have revealed that Europa likely harbors a huge subsurface ocean of liquid water, which may even be able to support Earth-like life.)

One of most famous images sent back by Voyager 1 is the “Pale Blue Dot” image. It is a photograph of Earth taken Feb. 14, 1990, by NASA’s Voyager 1 at a distance of 3.7 billion miles (6 billion kilometers) from the Sun. The image inspired the title of scientist Carl Sagan’s book, “Pale Blue Dot: A Vision of the Human Future in Space,” in which he wrote: “Look again at that dot. That’s here. That’s home. That’s us.”

Thought you’d like to know Voyager 1 is still “on the job.” Almost 48 years. Nice.

Sources: NASA and Space.com (Elizabeth Howell)

The Commandment to Love

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This coming Sunday is the 5th Sunday of Easter in Liturgical Year C. The gospel is taken from John 13:31-35. Previously Jesus indicated that He would be with them only a short time longer.

34 I give you a new commandment: love one another. As I have loved you, so you also should love one another. 35 This is how all will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.” This is the first of two instances (13:34; 15:12) in which Jesus commanded his disciples to love one another, but only on this occasion did he refer to it as a ‘new’ command. What is new about this commandment? It can refer to something that didn’t exist before. But the command to love one another is not recent. It is found in the Torah (Lev 19:18; Dt 6:4). It can refer to something that existed previously, but was not fully known or understood; e.g., a “new” understanding. I think that it is in this sense that this commandment is “new”.

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Jesus’ Departure

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This coming Sunday is the 5th Sunday of Easter in Liturgical Year C. The gospel is taken from John 13:31-35. Referring again to his imminent departure, Jesus said to his disciples, “My children, I will be with you only a little while longer You will look for me, and as I told the Jews, ‘Where I go you cannot come,’ so now I say it to you” (v.33). 

“My children (teknia)…” This term of endearment expresses Jesus’ love for his disciples and is a poignant introduction to his announcement that his departure is imminent. The term a little longer (eti mikron) is imprecise (cf. 7:33), so they could not be sure how soon this separation would take place, but given the announcement of the betrayal they might suspect that it would be very soon. Jesus seems to refer not just to the time of separation between his death and resurrection, but also to the time thereafter. For he says they will look for him, which they did not do after his death, but which they did do after the resurrection. Just as the first disciples sought him out (1:38), so will they continue to seek for him after his departure. Part of the purpose of the farewell discourse is to tell them of the new ways in which they will find him in the future.

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Pope Leo’s Dad

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Pope Leo comes from a Navy family! Pope Leo XIV’s father, Louis Marius Prevost, served in the Navy during World War II. After graduating from college, he was commissioned in November 1943 and became the executive officer of a tank landing ship. He participated in the D-Day landings in Normandy, France, June 6, 1944, as part of Operation Overlord. He also commanded an infantry landing craft, which the Allies used to land infantry soldiers and Marines onto beaches during the war.

The Normandy coastline did not have the port capacity for the enormous number of materials needed to keep the Allied momentum going. The Navy subsequently sent Prevost and other landing ships to southern France, as part of Operation Dragoon beginning Aug. 15, 1944.

Prevost spent 15 months overseas and attained the rank of lieutenant junior grade before the war in Europe finally ended, May 8, 1945.

Credit: By David Vergun, DOD News

Remain in His Love

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“As the Father loves me, so I also love you. Remain in my love.  If you keep my commandments, you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and remain in his love.” (John 15:9-10)

But have you noticed the nature of “love” that is the focus? What is absent in these verses are any words about the disciples loving Jesus or God. Although such images and words are found elsewhere in the Gospel of John. Clearly one of the great commandments is to love God.  But here in the Farewell Discourse, on the eve of Jesus’ departure from their lives in the manner in which they are accustomed, the emphasis in our text is on God’s love for them (us) and their (our) love for one another.

I like this story by Philip Yancy (What’s So Amazing about Grace? 68-69) reflecting on these verses:

Not long ago I received in the mail a postcard from a friend that had on it only six words, “I am the one Jesus loves.” I smiled when I saw the return address, for my strange friend excels at these pious slogans. When I called him, though, he told me the slogan came from the author and speaker Brennan Manning. At a seminar, Manning referred to Jesus’ closest friend on earth, the disciple named John, identified in the Gospels as “the one Jesus loved.” Manning said, “If John were to be asked, ‘What is your primary identity in life?’ he would not reply, ‘I am a disciple, an apostle, an evangelist, an author of one of the four Gospels,’ but rather, ‘I am the one Jesus loves.’“

What would it mean, I ask myself, if I too came to the place where I saw my primary identity in life as “the one Jesus loves”? How differently would I view myself at the end of a day?

Sociologists have a theory of the looking-glass self: you become what the most important person in your life (wife, father, boss, etc.) thinks you are. How would my life change if I truly believed the Bible’s astounding words about God’s love for me, if I looked in the mirror and saw what God sees?

Gail O’Day [John in the New Interpreter’s Bible, 759] remarks: “Jesus reminds the disciples (including the readers) that their place with him is the result of his initiative, not theirs; relationship with Jesus is ultimately a result of God’s grace (cf. 6:37-39, 44).” 

These verses are a reminder that in the reality of the post-Resurrection world, when secular concerns and challenges bring us to the edge of strength and perseverance, we are loved.

Image credit: Duccio di Buoninsegna (1255–1319), “Jesus taking leave of his Apostles,” ca. 1310 | Panel 4 of the Maestro, Museo dell’Opera del Duomo, Siena | Public Domain

Scuttlebutt

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Scuttlebutt – a word meaning rumor, gossip. emerging information, or whatever news is being passed around the office coffee pot or water fountain. Not sure how much it is used in every day life, but I do know it was common in naval circles – and there is a reason why! From our good friends at Merriam-Webster’s Word of the Day:

When office workers catch up on the latest scuttlebutt around the water cooler, they are continuing a long-standing tradition that probably also occurred on sailing ships of yore. Back in the early 1800s, scuttlebutt (an alteration of scuttled butt) referred to a cask containing a ship’s daily supply of fresh water (scuttle means “to cut a hole through the bottom,” and butt means “cask”); that name was later applied to a drinking fountain on a ship or at a naval installation. In time, the term for the water source was also applied to the gossip and rumors disseminated around it, and the latest chatter has been called “scuttlebutt” ever since.

Clutter

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I think we all go through episodes of “spring cleaning.” Parishes are often asked: “could the parish use…” and what follows is a litany of things old and beloved, unusual and familiar, new and used, useful and whimsical, and the occasional, “I don’t know what it is, but it seems like it is holy.” The conversation is hardly ever (perhaps never?) with a person from the millennial or Gen Z demographic. At this point in their lives, they live unburdened by too much stuff and do not yet have the same emotional connection to things as did the generations before. They are a mobile group and thus don’t want a lot of stuff when moving house or moving to a new city. IKEA will do just fine until things settle.

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St. Matthias

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According to the Acts of the Apostles, chosen by God through the apostles to replace Judas Iscariot following the latter’s betrayal of Jesus and his subsequent death. His calling as an apostle is unique, in that his appointment was not made personally by Jesus (who had already ascended into heaven), and it came before the descent of the Holy Spirit upon the early Church.

There is no mention of a Matthias among the lists of disciples or followers of Jesus in the three synoptic gospels, but according to Acts, he had been with Jesus from his baptism by John the Baptist until Jesus’ Ascension. In the days following, Peter proposed that the assembled disciples, who numbered about 120, nominate two men to replace Judas. 

So they proposed two, Joseph called Barsabbas, who was also known as Justus, and Matthias. Then they prayed, “You, Lord, who know the hearts of all, show which one of these two you have chosen to take the place in this apostolic ministry from which Judas turned away to go to his own place.” Then they gave lots to them, and the lot fell upon Matthias, and he was counted with the eleven apostles.”(Acts 1:24-25)

No further information about Matthias is to be found in the canonical New Testament.

All information concerning the ministry and death of Matthias is vague and contradictory. The tradition of the Greeks says that St. Matthias spread Christianity around Cappadocia and on the coasts of the Caspian Sea.  According to the historian Nicephorus, Matthias first preached the Gospel in Judaea, then what is modern-day Georgia. There he was crucified. A book known as the Coptic Acts of Andrew and Matthias, places his activity similarly in the modern Georgian region of Adjara where Matthias is buried.

Another tradition maintains that Matthias was stoned at Jerusalem by the local populace, and then was beheaded. According to Hippolytus of Rome, Matthias died of old age in Jerusalem.