keep your fork

Posted on December 20, 2024 by Rev. Joe Jagodensky, SDS.
“Keep Your Fork”
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A Season(s) of Grief and Joy

Posted on December 18, 2024 by Rev. Joe Jagodensky, SDS.

“Grief, for me, has held so many unexpected emotions. We most often think of sadness, and there is much sadness in grief. But there is also relief, there is anger, there is defeat, there even is joy. I thought it was humorous as I was making the reminder flyer for this service that at the top, I wrote a description of this service and how though it is a season of joy, many of us are mourning and I invited you to come together as we mourn.. And then at the bottom, on the same paper, in the same strokes of my typing, I invited you later this week to spread the joy of the Christmas season.  

And the reality of those -grief and joy- coexisting is the reality that we live in. Remembering the people that we have lost is often painful, but even in the hardest of it, at funeral services and even bedsides of hospitals immediately after a death, I have experienced laughter with friends and families, sharing stories of our departed loved ones.
In this season though, it can feel unnatural to be experiencing sadness at a time when so many around us are experiencing joy, but our world is full of these seemingly opposites coinciding, this great juxtaposition.  
 
We must not succumb to the darkness, to the sadness of it all.  And yet we must at the same time make space in this season of joy for the sadness of our grief. Because yes, this is a season of joy, and yes, there will be joy and laughter in remembering stories of our lost loved ones or remembering holidays gone by, but there is also sadness.  

Sadness that they are no longer celebrating with us. Sadness that things are not as they once were. Sadness in our inability to do the things that we once could. Sadness that our holidays look different than they once were. Sadness that our world is changing in a way that we are uncomfortable with. So much sadness can exist in the remembering.  

The memories continue to live.

Thich Nhat Hanh, Tibetan monk and peace advocate, once said: “Hope is important because it can make the present moment less difficult to bear. If we believe that tomorrow will be better, we can bear a hardship today.”
 
This is the hope that we cling to. We hope that we experience God’s comfort. We hope that we experience some rest from the often overwhelmingness of grief. We hope we experience God’s life and light in the midst of death and darkness. We hope that tomorrow will be better than today.  

And in the meantime, we endure.  We grieve. We honor our loved ones.

We allow for tears in a season of joy. And we allow for joy in a season of grief.”

(written by Alexis Johnson, Chaplain of Alexian Village of Milwaukee)

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In Between Time

Posted on December 16, 2024 by Rev. Joe Jagodensky, SDS.
“In Between” Time
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Who is Jesus Christ?

Posted on September 16, 2024 by Rev. Joe Jagodensky, SDS.

Jesus asks the others who do people say that I am. What an  unknowable question to ask. Jesus doesn’t know that he’s the son of God? Jesus doesn’t know that he is God? Jesus doesn’t know that he’s the son of a carpenter? That his mother loves blue dresses. 

Why is it important for him to ask other people who he is?  A tad self-involved, don’t you think? Do we ask other people who they think we are? Never. We show them. Who we are is seen in and through our words and actions. Even seen in our inaction not unheard in our words. 

But not Jesus Christ. He wants to play Drew Carey holding that thin microphone, in front of an television audience, asking Johnny Gilbert (I think he’s dead) to bring up the next contestants. 

“Who do people say that I am,” asks the Son of God. First one says, “John the Baptist.” Urnnn. Jesus replies, “If I’m not mistaken you’re able to see my head.” Next loser guesses Elijah to which host Jesus says, “He died centuries ago, do your homework.”

Jesus repeats the question before the first commercial break and the guy who wants everyone to like him (check his identity) announces, “One of the prophets!”  Jesus smilingly says, “You just gave a genetic answer that could amount to anyone but yes, I am one of the prophets. But you still lose.” Urnnn.

The first pope buzzes in with the correct answer and Jesus kindly looks at him and solemnly nods his head. (Break for commercial.)

Minutes later, after too many commercials, in this make-believe quiz show, our host predicts suffering for himself and needing “flint” for his cheeks, not rebelling and never, ever turning back, (declaring) “See, the Lord God is my help; who will prove me wrong?”

Who proved him wrong was the first pope! He was born Simon, the gameshow host changed his name to Peter and now renames him Satan. (That’s a lot of visits to City Hall and filling out all those forms about changing your name.)

Jesus played many serious games with his disciples. They so very often either ignored, questioned, didn’t understand or thought only of themselves. Sound a bit like us?

Jesus played us and we fell for it. The division of uncovering personal identity is always 3/4 for and about you and 1/4 for the others to either guess, gossip about or just makeup. Jesus today made it the opposite by offering 3/4 of himself to others and nobody got it, or got him—gameshow over. In postproduction add the clapping, laughter, and closing credits and then put the show on the schedule.

How else can you successfully and joyfully your live – both mentally and spiritually except with the 3/4 of you growing and evolving within and for you, through the grace of God, the witness of our host Jesus Christ, and the ever-present presence of the Holy Spirit.

The unknowing 1/4? That’s up to the watching audience.

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“The Wizard of ‘God’”

Posted on July 6, 2024 by Rev. Joe Jagodensky, SDS.

Francis Phillip Wuppermann (June 1, 1890 – September 18, 1949), known professionally as Frank Morgan, was an American character actor.

Better known to us as the Frank Morgan who famously played the “Wizard” in “The Wizard of Oz” in 1939. He was hardly the star whose name’s in the title. There’s darling Judy Garland trying to find a home that she already possessed. Her traveling companions after the Kansas tornado are a brainless straw man, a heartless tin man, and a lion who believes himself to be a coward. All three gentlemen are wrong about themselves.

All the characters now living in her tornado mind but loving in her real life. Even that “wizard,” Frank Morgan, was simply a traveling magician.

Comes now to us and a supposedly consoling friend tells you in your time of tornado troubles, “God only gives you what you can handle.” What a stupid, senseless sentence of belief. Surely ends further conversation. How can you argue with God? The “Frank Morgan’s God” is conveniently hidden behind the curtain pulling levels, wheeling wheels, switching switches galore, and just for effect? Expelling smoke. (Adding smoke is always a good touch for a wizard.)

“God will only give you what you can handle.” Limitless then, by any count. Pretty safe statement but awkwardly clumsy and dangerous theology.

A wife and mother writes:

“Well-meaning friends often share this misquoted truth with me when they learn of our family’s circumstances over the past few years. Many quote it as a verse straight from the Bible.We moved cross-country with two toddlers and, within a week of moving, were surprised by the news I was pregnant with boy-girl twins. Meanwhile, my husband changed careers and had to figure out a brand-new field on his own. I gave birth to the twins only to discover shortly after holding them in my arms that one of them had Down syndrome.

Two months later, COVID-19 hit and I had to supervise my two older children doing school from home while I breastfed newborn twins. While continuing to reel from the news that we were suddenly parents of a child with special needs, we discovered the other twin had a rare disease that would require very involved at-home medical care and multiple surgeries. In between surgeries, our baby with Down syndrome began having brain-damaging seizures that required multiple hospitalizations.

All these events took place in rapid succession. The emotional toll on our family is incredible. Suffice to say, the weight on our souls has felt absolutely unbearable, and we’ve been clinging to Christ for dear life.”

Is this wife and mother subject to the smoke and Frank’s pulling away at those heavenly levels? Is this wife and mother another Job, David or Moses story? Does God give us all these troubles the same way God gives us gifts and blessings that we think about so very often?

The answer to both is “no.” Does God even have a quota in mind of how much pain and blessings for each of us? Again, the answer to both is a resounding “no.”

The solution is not found through Judy or Frank but those three guys – straw, tin, and a durable wagging tail. Brains, heart, and courage.

God does not dole out curses nor does He dole out blessings. What God does provide for each of us is a heart, critically thinking and discerning. An influencing heart full of compassion and caring. And all buttressed through the courage of our living faith.

Those are the divine gifts gifted for any of our lives. Who removes the false notions of God’s curtain? It’s our soul filled intuition. The movie has Toto pulling the curtain open but our great faith has the movie of the Holy Spirit – staring three of her wonderful seven gifts.

Now, do you think you can handle that?

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“Do You Like Yourself?”

Posted on May 26, 2024 by Rev. Joe Jagodensky, SDS.

I wonder what it’s like to like yourself. What does it feel and look like?

Would you wake up smiling at this new day to balance that baffling one before? Is your head even with your back and your steps lighter? Does that bright blue sweater replace the solidly black one you often wear? Do you need less salt on your food because you’re now able to taste the food’s flavors and then enjoy one scoop of ice cream when you wanted two? Do you copy your nearby cat at mid-afternoon and close your eyes for thirty glorious minutes?

Does liking yourself soften your car’s music not to bother the one next to yours and is your “Thank you” authentic to the cashier with all her tattoos in full view?

Nearing eighty years, can you smile, replacing a curse word, when that top button will just not button?

During that party, that corner is now replaced with a fake plant because you are mingling, engaging, and enjoying the company of others as they are enjoying yours. Is this what it is like to like yourself? To be yourself. Does liking yourself help others to like themselves? Isn’t this a beautiful virus?

Liking is only the primer before the final coat of love. Isn’t, “Love one another as you love yourself” written somewhere? Yet, how can that happen, occur, and transform your and other’s lives; unless you, don’t kinda, but sincerely like…

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One in God’s Spirit

Posted on May 14, 2024 by Rev. Joe Jagodensky, SDS.

God’s spirit will call the people from the East to join hands with the people from the West, and the people from the North to join hands with the people from the South and all will seek the other’s good. None will smite [another], nor deal deceitfully. They will sing at their labors, and be thankful for the fruits of the fields and factories. Their soldiers will learn the arts of peace. . . . All will be spared the degradation of making implements of war and the agonizing shame of using them. God’s spirit will join an old man’s wisdom with a young man’s strength and they will be partners for the Lord. They will respect one another, and will be slow to take offense and quick to forgive. . . .

God’s spirit will give eyes to [humankind] with which to see the glory of the Lord. God’s spirit will give ears . . . to hear the sound of his trumpet as well as his still small voice. He will dwell with us and be our God, and we shall be his people. He will wipe away our tears, dispel our doubt, remove our fears, and lead us out. He will heal the brokenhearted, open the eyes of the blind, release the captives, preach the good news to the poor, and usher in the acceptable year of the Lord. He will bulldoze the mountains and fill in the valleys, he will make the rough places smooth and the crooked ways straight. He’ll stand every man on his feet so that all [humankind] may see his glory together.

Clarence Jordan, “The Substance of Faith and Other Cotton Patch Sermons”

Clarence Jordan (1912–1969), a farmer and New Testament Greek scholar, was the founder of Koinonia Farm, a small but influential religious community in southwest Georgia. He was instrumental in founding Habitat for Humanity.

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Marriage Blessing for Second or Third Marriage

Posted on May 11, 2024 by Rev. Joe Jagodensky, SDS.

god of the Sun – Roman-Apollo, Greek-Apollo

Light reveals, reflects and illumines.
May the warmth of your mutual devotion for each other always enlighten each other’s life.

god of War – Roman-Mars, Greek-Ares

May your disagreements always be minor. May your discords only lead to a merging of hearts, even when the minds may disagree.

Messenger god – Roman-Mercury, Greek-Hermes

May your thoughts always convey your devotion to each other. May your messages, spoken and unspoken, be based only in a mutual trust and understanding.

god of Time – Roman-Saturn, Greek-Cronus

Since time is running out for both of you, may you never hesitate to express, show and freely give your love to each other. May you remember that time is but a number and your love, forever.

god of Growth – Roman-Maia, Greek-Persephone

May the god of Growth only increase within you both because of each other. Like good wine, only with age can we truly and genuinely know, forgive, love, and immensely feel.

god of Wealth – Roman-Plutus, Greek-Pluto

May the god of Wealth, despite a teacher’s salary yet buffeted by a CEO’s be with you both. May you always know that the richness and wealth of your lives together can never be counted or measured but can only be cherished and lived.

And, to all the gods and the God of us all…”If at first you don’t succeed…”

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Who’s the Vine & Who’s the Branch?

Posted on April 29, 2024 by Rev. Joe Jagodensky, SDS.

“Remain in me” is the gospel imperative calling us to an intimacy in Christ that must be the foundation of our identity. St. John tells us that we remain in him when we fulfill the commandment to love by living in his Spirit.

What does it mean to “remain in Christ?”

First of all, we have to ask ourselves which Jesus is the “Christ” in which we hope and pray ourselves to be and remain? The gospels portray various facets of Jesus as “the Christ.” These same gospels also portray Jesus as, well, Jesus. The meaning of remaining “in Christ” takes shape in the scriptures for not only Jesus but also includes you and me.

Take John’s gospel, for example. The first sign of Jesus witnessing to the presence of God’s love at work in him is at a party—the wedding feast at Cana. There’s the Jesus who refuses his mother request saying that it’s not time to be “Christ.” However, collaborating with his mother, Jesus brings people together for a good time, foreshadowing the reign of God’s love.

A life that resonates with this Christ today is a hospitable presence in a world desperate for communion. Jesus also uses his “Christ-ness” in serving the best wine last. A total “no-no” when you’re paying the wedding bill or is it Christ-like?

There is also the Jesus who performs his song and dance to the gathered listeners but then he escapes to a lonely mountain. His “Christ-ness” hears those gathering listeners following him who want and need to hear even more about faith and fidelity to God. He slowly becomes Christ, as we do, and then joining them enjoying fish and chips at the sea or in making a couple of fish become baskets full leftovers for all the folks to take home with them. No refrigerators, so quickly please pass and share the Good News about the food of life to your neighbors and friends.

That’s his beautiful, powerful vine story about himself and us. There’s that ever growing and expanding vine bearing fruit for all to pay attention to and enjoy. Whether it’s salty fish, cheap wine or good wine, a shared piece of bread, telling and sharing a story or two, or touching his tortured side, as Sly and the Family Stone sang, “It’s a Family Affair.”

Fast forward to the account of the woman caught in adultery. In this story of misery meeting mercy, a woman is about to be stoned. Rather than expressing scorn or condemnation, Jesus, or now the Christ, offers only words of love and mercy. In our human judgmental world we keep our stones close at hand. Sin sticks. But to remain “in Christ” is to be a nonjudgmental presence with no dividing stones at hand to cast but open hands calming us to heed that other Divine voice, the Holy Spirit.

The garden of Gethsemane is the best duality example of our Jesus/Christ story. First, it’s the earnest plea of “Father, let this cup pass (Jesus) followed by his saying “Your will be done.” (Christ-stuff)

When are we the searching and stumbling “Jesus” and when are we a “Christ-like” one?

Throwing stones is so maliciously easy…mercy is the Divine living within in us to come down from the mountains of ourselves and become the “Christ-like” to both ourselves and especially to others.

This may surprise you but Christ is not his last name. It is who he struggled with, argued about, bowed downed to and slowly became. Christ is not a last name, it is a title, an earned title. Can we hope and say the same about our searching and stumbling lives?

If we are not pruned of ourselves to reap the vine of a Christ-like love then we are very much withering away, alone.

“There is [but, only] one vine and we [We?] are the branches.”

Adapted from Fr. Richard M. Gula

Richard M. Gula, PSS, taught in seminaries and ministry formation programs for many years and then served as director of personnel for the U.S. Province of the Sulpicians. He is now retired.

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Returning God’s Love for Us

Posted on April 21, 2024 by Rev. Joe Jagodensky, SDS.

A great tragedy of our world is that men and women do not know, really know, that God loves them. Some believe it in a shadowy sort of way, but their belief in God’s love for them can be very remote and abstract.

Because of this, we do not know how to…we do not know how to…love God back. Often we don’t even try, because it all seems so very difficult or we can think we’re doing our faithful best by repeating repetitive words and rituals but we need to realize that the Christian faith, in its essence, is a love affair between God and each human being. Not just a simple love affair: it is a passionate love affair.

God so loved each of us that he created us in his image? Have you heard that one before? God so loved each of us that he became human himself, died on a cross, was raised from the dead by the Father, ascended into heaven—and all this in order to bring each of us back to himself, to that heaven which we had lost through our own fault? Sound kinda familiar?

Yes, of course us Christians have dogmas, rules and regulations but they all concern love, which is the essence. Dogmas and tenets without love are dead letters, not even worth spelling out. God is love. And where love is, God is.

It is time we awoke from our long sleep, we Christians. It is time we shed our fears of and about God.

Our relationship toward and about God tends to move in cycles. For how long we’ve heard of the necessity of a “personal relationship” with God as though that’s the end all. Heard countless times, “Is Jesus the Lord and Savior of your Life?” as though it’s a “yes/no quiz” question on life’s final test. Or, the best, or worse, is taking out of context and isolating one sentence out of John’s Gospel and making it the gospel: if you don’t accept Jesus as your Savior then you’re going to Hell. Period.

That’s not Catholic theology. That’s Protestant. There is of course a singular bond between the Creator and the created. But the very much stronger bond is called the Body of Christ. Kinda sounds familiar, I hope? The Body of Christ.

The Body of Christ that gathers and brings us to this ritual, the Body of Christ that we eat and the Body of Christ that we become, share and act upon in our behaviors and commitments to each other. And to our treatment of the earth and dealings with other nations.

Now that’s a passionate love worth embracing and living. The peace and joy we all seek? That love brings us and fills us up with an authentic, true and lasting peace. A Divine peace. This “Body of Christ love” immerses us in a joy far more fulfilling than that silly one sided God and Me one. Those private questions and answers that we all have and hold up are handled and erased by the amount of love that we love about ourselves and the love, care and support we extend to others.

Because as we say in Church, “Thanks be to God.”

Adapted from Catherine de Hueck Doherty, “Grace in Every Season”

Catherine de Hueck Doherty (1896–1985), a laywoman of Russian heritage, was foundress of the Madonna House Apostolate in Combermere, Canada. Details at madonnahouse.org.

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