My favorite comic strip is “Calvin and Hobbes.” If you are not familiar, it features Calvin, a preternaturally bright six year-old, and Hobbes, his imaginary tiger friend. The comic strip manages to infuse wondering (and wandering) on a cosmic scale into an ageless world of lazy Sunday afternoons, space adventures, and tales of befuddled babysitters, teachers, and parents. What I most enjoy about Calvin and Hobbes is that it reminds me of our capacity to be surprised, to imagine, and enter into mystery and wonderment. Calvin’s openness to the mystery of it all allowed him entry to even the theological arts where he mused about the combination of predestination with procrastination, finally concluding, “God put me on this earth to accomplish a certain number of things. Right now I am so far behind that I will never die.” Continue reading
Looking deeply
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There are moments in this life when I wished I processed more insight about what was happening in the moment that is now. They are often moments caught up in the midst and whirl of things; moments when I look back and wished I had paused and considered what was stirring within. Attentive to the now.
After having graduated from the US Naval Academy – the first cauldron of forming leaders for the Navy and Marine Corp – and after finishing nuclear power training and submarine school, I reported as a bright shiny Ensign to my first submarine! I was ready to be a deep-diving, backing down full at crush depth, denizen of the deep – “Run Silent, Run Deep” and “Hunt for Red October” all rolled into one.
A while back I read a classic summer beach novel – you know the ones: easy to read, entertaining, no heavy lifting required … and no I don’t remember the title. But I remember this, there are good guys being chased by bad guys. The good guys are only armed with their wit, imagination, guile, luck, and their paranoid friend who believes every conspiracy theory is true. The premise is that everything in the world has a radio frequency identification (RFID) chip embedded in it. When the good guys decide to use cash only so that they stay off the grid, it doesn’t matter because their credit cards and driver’s licenses have RFID chip that, although still unused in their wallets and purses, are detected by the RFID scanner at the checkout counter. As the novel races along the bad guys track the good guys via RFID. The good guys keep emptying their lives getting rid of toll road passes, cell phones, driver’s licenses, credit cards, passports, access badges for work, the groceries and clothes they just purchased for cash… and still the bad guys keep coming. Holy guacamole! There is no place to hide! The bad guys can pick then out of a crowd of a gazillion people. As we read, we cheer for the good guys, we get involved, as if we really and deeply know them. It is as though we can really see them!
It is a familiar gospel, a well-known story. It is an episode of “Doubting Thomas.” The one held up for us as an example of what not to be – the one who doubted Jesus. “Don’t be a Doubting Thomas!” we are warned because that leaves you one step away from being Judas.
Back in the day, two friends and I started a business. We were a good mix of skills, dispositions, and work ethic. One of the partners, Jack, was the best project manager I ever encountered. His staff loved him, and the clients always wanted to know if Jack was managing their particular project. We had one client in the Midwest that made a very large contract contingent on Jack being the manager. That was fine. Jack had a demand of his own – and it was non-negotiable. The client insisted, but Jack held firm. He was clear, convicted, and certain: no matter what, he would be attending the Summer Olympics and the World Track and Field championships. That was his non-negotiable: his vacation. 
Words, catch phrases, and other strings of words, in the right context, can tell entire stories. In the United States, say the words “Oh say can you see….” and a whole story of this country’s struggle for freedom from European powers comes to mind. Such are the power of words and stories. If the title of this post made sense to you, then you are clearly a fan of the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) – and especially of the movies Avengers: Infinity War and Avengers: Endgame. Not to worry, I won’t attempt to explain the MCU, all its characters, and the many threads and storylines. But if you are interested in an overview, start 
Way back in the day, before this life as a Franciscan, I was helping out with a teen ministry program at my parish. I will always remember one comment a young woman made: “It’s not like I have a contract with God or anything.”
friarmusings 