Who Are You?

Posted on April 30, 2015 by Rev. Joe Jagodensky, SDS.

Who Are You?.

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Wisconsin: “It’s Home”

Posted on April 24, 2015 by Rev. Joe Jagodensky, SDS.
"Oh well, it's home."

“Oh well, it’s home.”

February
You’ve felt a sore throat for a couple of days now but dismiss it saying to yourself, “It’s nothing.”  (Funny how we all become doctors when it comes to our health.)  The next day arrives and you know you’ll not make it through the day as the congestion is in full swing.  For the good of fellow employees and yourself you make the phone call that puts all your duties on hold for at least one day.
“Now what?” you say.  It’s 6:00 a.m., work has been alerted and the entire day lays before you.  “Too early for the ‘Price is Right’ and ‘As the World Turns” hasn’t been on the air since your grandmother died.  Bundled up in your bathrobe you make some tea and add honey, the brandy is saved for after 5 p.m.  The living room corner is a good spot where you spot snowflakes that grow in number.  The mystery book you’ve half read is on the ottoman.  “Ummm,” you murmur.  You easily get back into the book’s seedy and heroic characters and the snows continues to fall.  Three hours passes including the nap just when the book’s action was getting good and the snow falls faster.
You repeat taking your over-the-counter stuff that’s supposed help the stuff in your head and nose and it’s time for lunch with the afternoon holding what ever is ahead.

July
It’s your turn to host the neighborhood party.  Fifteen people responded and you’ve been looking forward to this since summer began.  The backyard’s been mowed and the grill is warming up as the warm air offers a periodic breeze to balance the day.  Evenings are always the best when the sun sets and another kind of the day begins.  The neighbors are full of neighborly happenings and the punch is slightly spiked to give a slight zing without all the expensive bottles.  The smoke and smells remind you of a Catholic Church on a happy feast day but this time the sights and scents are brats and burgers.  7:00 p.m. the neighbors are jovial and strengthening connections keeping the neighborhood safe and strong.  It’s a full moon but that was not planned nor was it planned that the last group would leave at 2:00 a.m.  That’s okay, you had enough punch to see you through night.

or

February
You have an important meeting at 7:00 a.m. and corporate is expected to be there awaiting PowerPoint and Excel explanations of everything that needs explaining.  It’s been snowing all night with eight inches already on the group and you don’t have time to shovel and hope the mail carrier doesn’t curse your mother.  You plow your car backwards through the snow and out of the driveway and make it to work on time but you forget a second pair of shoes might have helped.

July
After the long wintry snow-filled months you are anticipating that all fifteen of your neighbors will arrive, each bringing something to share from their specialties or a favorite family recipe.  The weatherman said the high would be 95 today but they’ve been wrong how many times before.  The neighbors arrive and you finally admit that if it’s not the temperature, it’s the humidity.  Discussion about the weather goes on for much longer than necessary because everyone feels the hot weather through their sweaty shirts and shorts.  “The dining room will work!” you say after mowing the lawn and trimming the hedges for nothing.  The fifteen plus your family huddle together surrounded by the wonders of AC and enjoy the punch meant for the outside.  You sweat your way through the brats and burgers all by yourself.  The evening proceeds well in the confines of your otherwise winter confines and the neighborhood-jokester suggests, “How about a fire tonight?”  The next day is sunny, pleasant with a high of 75 degrees with low humidity. 

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It Takes “Two”

Posted on April 23, 2015 by Rev. Joe Jagodensky, SDS.

57144There’s something about combining 1 and 1.  Three Dog Night told us over forty years ago that “One is the loneliest number that you’ll every do.”  They are only “terrible” when your teeth are growing otherwise it is the combination of ones we cannot resist.

No, this isn’t about marriage and that one and one are madly in love.  Two marriages is common these days with even three creeping in as in, “ready, set, go.”  The “go” seems to be the final one although I got to know and like one and two.

“One” just doesn’t seem enough.  “Let’s have one for the road,” doesn’t mean one but means the one added to the previous numbers.  I have two cats.  Seems right just in case one, you know, experiences that ninth live.   For vacation I pack at least two of almost everything in case one proves to be not enough.  I began to watch the current “Noah” movie but stopped when hoards of animals are let on the ark when only two were permitted.  (The only biblical part of that film was its title.)

I keep a cloak in my car trunk in case someone asks me for my cloak as Jesus demands of me, “Sure, here you go” as I walk back to my car.  Insincere or wise planning?

We have two arms and legs which suits us well in life’s travels.  You cannot have a war with yourself, even the Civil War was clearly divided into, twos.  Forget the distractions of sports when one team shows up for the match and you’re left with your second cup of beer with your second wife, your two children (one hers, the other yours), remembering that second mortgage on your home which explains the second job you have and your in-laws (two) visiting for the weekend (three).

There’s two sides to every story which we all refuse to believe in our rigid, single-minded views (Three Dog Night anyone?)  We should all have two friends when one takes a second look at us.  (Women seem to be much better at increasing friend size than guys are.)

All of our simplified-making life is based on that magic number: sin/grace, heaven/hell, God/devil, plaid/solid, up/down, inside and you already know, democrat and we don’t wish the second on anyone, Ecclesiastes and its solemn list of twos that most funerals seem to include and I’ve heard more than twice.

Stephen Sondheim gets his two cents worth with “Into The Woods” and the song, “It Takes Two”
“I thought one was enough, It’s not true: It take two of us You came through When the journey was rough.  It took you.  It took two of us.”

Your crisis needs to be shared and you call your first friend who has the message waiting for you.  You instantly call your second friend who answers never saying that it’s your second call.  The second friend listens and you smile at the caring advice.  Friend One calls back and you say, “It’s alright, I have it taken care of.”

Before this gets to be too (couldn’t resist) much, I end my tribute to twos.  Although I need to add for a second time the importance of twos in our lives.  I found a sale online and bought two shirts.  They arrive in…guess? – two weeks.

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“Walking With Jesus”

Posted on April 21, 2015 by Rev. Joe Jagodensky, SDS.

goChristWithChild 001That is what a church sign shows me driving to work each morning.  I thought how difficult that is for us.  I don’t mean the usual stuff of sacrifice or dedication.  I mean it’s difficult because we know how his story ends.  It’s not fair walking with someone when you know how the someone and something turns out.

I’m at an age where the first few words of hearing the gospel, I say to myself, “Oh, it’s that one again” and my mind wanders toward lunch.  I’m able to do the same thing with songs of my era, four notes into it is my best and I can tell you the artist, title and sometimes the record label. (Church repetition and radio days do have some things in common.)

Traditional piety is in knowing the end of Jesus’ story in order for us to copy it as best as possible.  Isn’t it more enriching and rewarding to question Jesus along side with those doubting apostles we hear about on Sunday?  If you notice, after the resurrection Jesus tells his disciples the good stuff when no one else is around.  (Ohhh, I just wrecked it for many of you…now you know that he resurrects.  Darn it.)  Can we identify with any of those biblical needy folks who approach Jesus looking for something but not knowing if he’s able to help?  My favorite biblical story is the blind guy who approaches Jesus for a cure and Jesus asks the most profound question to him: “What do you want?”   Isn’t it obvious?  But it is not until the seeker knows what to seek.

Understanding Jesus is to look back at his whole story including the ending.  We can only look back at our lives without sugar coating our parts and then look forward without knowing the ending.

All the Jesus movies are viewed with its sensational ending in mind.   Scourging, thorns or the final spear, we know what happens next.  He comes back to life, scares the guys with his “peace to you” statements, eats a lot of fish, ascends up and away and sends the Holy Spirit while he assumes his position at the right hand of his rightful position.

I want to walk with Jesus.  I’d love to have him beside me, above me, behind and within me.  Sometimes I wish that I did not know his ending so that my walk with him might be truly a mutual walk toward a surprising and unknown end.

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Body, Mind & Spirt?

Posted on April 19, 2015 by Rev. Joe Jagodensky, SDS.
The Missing Link?

The Missing Link?

Ahhhhh. That’s finished.  Those conflicting and independent concepts are now united as in blissful marriage.  (Is there such a thing?)

We’ve achieved it or at least attempted to.  Makes a wonderful slogan for a company to place on the jacket’s heart, key ring or pens or mugs or bumper stickers.  Waiting for the light to turn green you can find comfort that the car in front of you has achieved what has eluded you, and you wonder why did a Taurus get that elusive union before your BMW?

Independent is an understatement in these strong, self-relying models in our lives.  The mind is the one we rely upon the most and he loves the ongoing attention.  He seems the strongest since he talks to us the most.  Does the body respond to the mind or does the mind give the body a cold when a job evaluation is the next day?  The Spirit?  Spirit cleverly tries to bring together body and mind as though they are doing their own work when Spirit has an agenda of her own.  Wild and wily in theory but organizing all the loose stuff of her two competitors.

My company places high value on the union of these three words as though union can be reached.  A “Core Value” they call it complementing our culture’s present preoccupation with these three words.  Achieved?  Easily through Yoga, prayer, meditation, daily exercise, vitamin pills, retreats, sabbaticals, eating the right vegetables, quitting smoking or swinging a dead chicken in a plastic bag over your head three times a day.

Quick, magic solutions to the complex, magic we call life.  As one author says it, “The cooking vessel of the soul takes in everything, everything can become soul and by taken into its imagination any and all events, the psychic grows.”

Ahhhhh, in our culture we have it all figured out if we only condense what is dense, if we only make real what is imagined, if we only make folly fact, if we only digest what can never be totally eaten; if only our lives were as simple as we think they are.  (Think.  See our minds at play?)

Body, mind and spirit.  Do you think we’re missing another important one or does the Yoga do it for us?

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Scrooge & Our Lives

Posted on April 19, 2015 by Rev. Joe Jagodensky, SDS.
Frozen in the Past

Frozen in the Past

It was another lonely meal beside the fireplace as he’s done night after night after a twelve hour day of balancing the books in unbalancing ways.  Crackling sounds growing louder pauses his meal as his dead partner visits with a warning of three more visitors after the old clock crackles midnight.  He gives a favorite sentence of mine to his dead friend, “You may be an undigested bit of beef, a blot of mustard, a crumb of cheese, a fragment of underdone potato. There’s more of gravy than of grave about you, whatever you are!”  

Denial always goes a long way instead of admitting what or who is before you.  Charles Dickens presents a timeless story which is more about time that any good or bad characters.  It is the only times that we have in life that embody his early morning visitors: past, present and future.  Each one contains a story.  To separate one time from another is to fragment life which only fragments our minds.  Instead of fragment, to live only in one time is to freeze yourself.  Scrooge’s frozen time is his past and that is the Christmas story which can be told and retold in any season.

“Men’s courses will foreshadow certain ends, to which, if persevered in, they must lead,” said Scrooge. “But if the courses be departed from, the ends will change.”  In spiritual terms, his statement can easily be called healing, in whatever form it takes within our fragmented or frozen lives.

The Ghost told Scrooge, “If man you be in heart, not adamant, forbear that wicked cant until you have discovered What the surplus is, and Where it is. Will you decide what men shall live, what men shall die?”  Whichever “f” you find yourself in the natural reaction is to block everything and everyone from your sights.  You are in this life by yourself , just like the meal you eat each night.

The frozen Scrooge gives another classic sentence, “If they would rather die, . . . they had better do it, and decrease the surplus population.”  In your imagination your problem is projected upon the world and that somehow validates your continuing to live in one of the “f’s.”

Dead partner visiting Scrooge at the beginning of the story provides for us with the story’s end and the ending of one of our “f’s,” “Mankind was my business; charity, mercy, forbearance, and benevolence, were, all, my business. The deals of my trade were but a drop of water in the comprehensive ocean of my business!”

A Common Humanity

A Common Humanity

The business of a “comprehensive ocean of my business” is rooted in a union with those around us as awkward, divisive, argumentative, harmonious or joyous as it will surely be.  Fragmented or frozen is healed through a unity of our life’s times: past, present and future.  The “f’s” are unleashed when a link (a new chain of connections breaks the chain that held us down) to our common humanity.  A humanity made strong whether with one person, a congregation, a family, a neighborhood or the nearby tavern on Friday nights for dice.

Then those around you will happily say to you, “Really, for a man who had been out of practice for so many years it was a splendid laugh!”  

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Stop Helping People

Posted on April 18, 2015 by Rev. Joe Jagodensky, SDS.

helping-handA friend approaches you and says, “I’m feeling down today.”  “Oh, why is that?” you say as though a clear and succinct answer is forthcoming.  “I’m not sure,” your friend replies.  “Let’s go have a drink and talk about it,” you chime in because there’s at least a cocktail in it for you.

Great idea.  Feeling low?  Go drink several depressants to help you deepen your not knowing what it is you’re doing.  (Drinking helps in movies but rarely in life.)

It knows no personality type but we all love to believe that we are helping people through the helpful help we think they need with our wisdom-filled solutions which are very often trite aphorisms; “time heals all wounds,” “there’s people worse off than you,” “it gets better,” or the worst of all is “that happened to me too!”  Misery loves what group?

I’ve often thought that helping another person is really about us.  We get to solve this person’s dilemma because it’s in the way of our lives and we get to be the saviors that solve whatever it is and our friendship becomes more solid than it was before.  Advice can be deadly especially after saying, “I know what you’re going through” whereas advise guides another to reflect and review.  In other words, Advice gets you to enjoy your cocktail while advise prolongs and prolongs your friend’s dilemma, which is the point.

“Father, I’m confused,” she says to me with an agenda that I will dissolve her confusion so she can continue on in her certitude.  I reply, “What a great place to be?”  Her eyes have that shock of “So where’s the answer?” coupled with “I thought you priests possess all the answers!”  Confusion is a wonderful state to be in.  You find that you’re caught between two thoughts – both seem legitimate -but still two conflicting thoughts or the stage you’ve enjoyed for years is closing and a new stage is beginning or what was tried and true now bores you.  You seek out the Church’s Wizard to choose a direction or solution for you.  (This method is much easier and less responsible on your part when someone else pulls the levels and releases the smoke by way of mirrors.)

What if we just stopped helping people which most often doesn’t help anyway?  Whether a friend or church-goer, a sincere “Ummmmm” goes miles and miles.  It presents back to the person that you have heard her/him and that you are with and support them.  (What are friends for!)  “Ummmmm” is profound regardless of how many “m’s” you add after the “u.”

I love when people use the words “confused,” “upset” or “troubled” or more colorful words with the same meaning.  It means that something is simmering that needs to simmer.  My intervention with a depressant drink only postpones the personal homework that needs to be done by my friend.

I will stand beside, along side and behind you for as long as it takes for peace to again fill your heart and steady your daily schedule.  Please don’t ask me to solve your problem so I can feel smug and you are left with my solution.

Because guess what’s next?  It’s called the “Blame Game.”

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Father Buoy

Posted on April 16, 2015 by Rev. Joe Jagodensky, SDS.

buoy_lighted_redAfter 35 years of this privilege and the shenanigans we call the Roman Catholic priesthood, I guess I’m entitled to some retrospect.

I’ve meet and heard about all types of us guys over those years.  There are those who want to build a moat around themselves complete with drawbridge in the kingdom they call their parish.  There are those who attend every offered conference in the hopes of gaining something, I guess, but I also guess it’s time away from the parish.  I’ve only met one who was able to serve at almost every of the 250 parishes in our diocese.  I think he gave up a suitcase and just went from one to the next and asked where the washing machine is kept.  There are those who I like to say, “take a shower with french cuffs on,” for they are plotting their next upward position as though priesthood is a Chess game when they think of themselves as knights when they are only pawns.  There are also those who are firmly planted and focused on parish or ministry needs.  The last group are the names that I cherish the most because they are most priestly to me.

Parishioners are as varied as Starbucks coffee choices.  A 90 year old came to me and said, “At my age, I guess I should be coming to church.  What do I need to do?”  I replied, “Come to church.”  I haven’t seen her since so I guess she’s waiting to be 180 and then repeat her question to the next generation of me.  (I guess I could have rented a red carpet for her.)  Another had a bad confession experience with one of mine and hasn’t been to church in over 70 years.  There are countless good stories of priests and Catholic folks and they are the most enriching for me but the weird ones seem to simmer.  At one parish I kidded the pastor saying, “We could have four people here tonight at 7:00 p.m. telling them we need to check all the rectory light bulbs.”  (He didn’t laugh.  Volunteers are wonderful people when committed to the Church and not escaping their homes.)

Is singing “We’ve Only Just Begun” at a wedding the worst thing that can happen to our centuries old institution?  Will a brick from St. Peter’s Basilica break during that wedding ceremony?  Will my monsignor ship be denied me by the those who grant it?  I’ve had good Catholic folks who told me after Mass that I missed a word or two in the prayers.  Do we now do it all over again?  Did Jesus miss our offering that day and found a more worthy Catholic parish and priest?

Father Buoy ought to be my new name as I continue this charade of “persona Christi.”  For we are all “persons of Christ” in our respective and humble walks of life.  Unfortunately other priests believe themselves to be “Christ, the “of” just got in the way, I guess.  (“Oh, how those small words get in the way…”)

A buoy is strongly buoying in the deep Catholic waters that are deeper than any of us could ever swim.  Throughout one’s priestly ministry there are many rowboats that approach this stationary but safe buoy.  One boat approaches me and I see that their oars are tattered and beaten down and unable to proceed forward.  “Let’s see what we can do about these oars of yours,” I hope I would say.  Another boat hits me with water leaking badly.  There is little I can do but place my gum in the hole until powers greater than me intercede for them.  Another rowboat approaches telling me that they are “testing the waters” to see what it feels like, what the flow is like.  I welcome them and invite them to keep rowing.  When I least expect it yet another boat floats toward me because their oars were lost years ago and there’s a ton of stories about how that happened with no solution to be had.  I scratch my head and act as though I have the answer when their ton is too much for me to carry.  Some priests would give them his oars but then he wouldn’t have any.  So what good is that?

Father Buoy, that’s me; ebbing and flowing through this mysterious but real reality we call the priesthood. “Person of Christ?”

Mothers are the “person of Christ,” with more balls in the air than Michael Jordan could handle, laborers are the “person of Christ,” in their dedication and in finding purpose in their work, those who struggle with any struggle are the “person of Christ” hoping some oars are somewhere waiting for them, the unemployed father of four who isn’t counted among the unemployed is the “person of Christ” but still has hope.  You guessed it.  My list is endless in the joys and difficulties we all handle as best we can in life using Christ as the person we hope to be.

I got my title through oil placed on my hands during a glorious ceremony attended by many.  You’ve earned your title, “Person of Christ” through life.  Unfortunately, I’m the one who gets the credit.

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Sam & Sylvia Are Me

Posted on April 15, 2015 by Rev. Joe Jagodensky, SDS.

AA027440I’ve had these two beastly cats for ten years now so I know their moods, behavior and movements as much as they know mine.

I have owned that they are both a part of me even though cats refused to be “owned” by anyone.  Sam, being the male, is outgoing and outpouring creature whose capacity for affection is limitless; until he tells you.  Sylvia, being female is coyer, the quiet type and hides her self the moment a moment becomes a moment for her.  (My cats hear and sense things far sooner than us underdeveloped types.)

A cordial evening meal with friends and my personality becomes Sam with my Sylvia always available inside me.  Gregarious and engaging, Sam charms those gathered while all the way Sylvia silently beckons me to quiet down and sometimes to retreat before dessert.

I’m Sylvia at home and Sam at work.  I guess it works because it has to.  To reverse the roles would make me a teenager again and not a good employee.  (Sam at night in my 20’s was enough for me!)  Driving home from work Sam slowly drifts away and Sylvia reemerges.  (I can actually feel the Jekyll/Hyde switch about 2/3 into my drive.)  They are both great cats, low maintenance compared to me but the mixture of their lives within me life intrigues me.

People are great but they often get in my way (Sylvia).  I have friends and I enjoy their company (Sam) but their stories take forever to be told with needless details (Sylvia) which finally makes a point (a relieved Sylvia) but my attention was already lost at the story’s third tangent (Sylvia).

The cleaning lady arrives when I’m gone.  Sam greets her and Sylvia skirts for closet’s corner.  Believe me, Sylvia’s bladder can outlast any Thanksgiving dinner at my house.  I’ve witnessed it when my family decides on one more round before rounding themselves home.  Sylvia’s relief must be what we aging guys sometimes feel.  Sam, however, has been a part of the entire evening weaving in between legs and rubbing around whomever and whatever is stationary.

I’ve known people who are purely Sam and I don’t know how they do it.  After a few minutes, I’d be exhausted.  I’ve also known Sylvias’ and feel sorry for them for their quiet intensity at privacy.

I like the mix and I think I’ll keep it.  Sam at work with a hint of Sylvia in my mind; and at home it’s totally quiet Sylvia with an eager Sam waiting for tomorrow.

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“Vicarious”

Posted on April 14, 2015 by Rev. Joe Jagodensky, SDS.

vicarious@2xIf, for just a moment, we could be that someone who is not us.  A part of us realizes that the investment is temporary but during that transient period we substitute ourselves for “that person.”

Each generation has those to choose from.  Today it’s just easier because of the media overload covering their inches instead of broader strokes.  I just need to say, “Kim” to someone in their 20’s and they know her last name.  Beyonce doesn’t need a last name, just those who wish to be her for a day, a week or a month.  Madonna had a last name but dropped the Italian one to be the opposite of her namesake.  (Talk about vicarious!)

Generations ago how many women wished they could give a come-back-line as biting as Bette Davis and not flinch or show a facial expression of Joan Crawford’s wrath and not blink.  The men had their assortment of substitute-personalities in Tryone Power or Erroll Flynn or Sean Connery who in his tux smugly says, “Shaken, not stirred.”  Rock Hudson had everyone fooled with his hetero presence hiding his homo personality and balancing the two for decades.  (That’s being duo which can be deadly, vicarious can be fun and helpful.)

Think of those you’ve admired and then you’ll know the vicarious lives we like to live.  The modeling is the best vicarious of all because of the qualities we can take from someone – imaginary or real.  One quality derived can help you in your life.

I remember a priest while I was in the seminary who at gatherings had this knack of making scripture connections to contemporary life.  He did it with such ease that it caught my attention.  I never forget how quickly he was able to make something ancient fresh.  How many years later I still remember him and smile when I’m able to do the same thing.

It’s fun and it may even be helpful to be the action hero or the lonely soul who finds his way; those guys in the movies.  If a personality – imagined or real triggers something within you – go for it.  Just remember where your shoes are when the vicarious adventure is over.

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