I just finished a live interview with Dina Marie at Mater Dei Radio about the close of the Year of Mercy and the beginning of Advent. If you have an hour, listen to our conversation from just minutes ago. Blessings, Fr. Ron
“Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.” Pencil: Ronald Raab, CSC
On the Margins from Mater Dei Radio, Portland, OR
Our Lord Jesus Christ, King of the Universe
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This solemnity moves us toward the reality that all things will unite in Christ Jesus. All things will be one in the love of Christ. In the end, all will be well. “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.”
On the Margins from Mater Dei Radio, Portland, OR
Thirty-Third Sunday in Ordinary Time
The gospel of Luke continues to try to wake us up. These earthly catastrophes point us into the direction of God’s presence. Be careful to what you cling to, be careful to what you seek. God’s presence will lead us safely home.
Order copies of The Unsheltered Heart: An Advent At-Home Retreat (Cycle A), 2010, by Ronald Patrick Raab, CSC, from Ave Maria Press, Notre Dame, Indiana.
REVIEW:
by Linda Showman,
U.S. Catholic – November 29, 2010 –
At first glance, the title of this book is not the most enticing approach to a retreat: Does one not enter into a retreat with the purpose of finding calm and peace? Don’t we expect the results of reflection to be direction, comfort, protection, even answers from God? Shelter from heartbreak is the very thing we seek when approaching God.
Father Ronald Raab, C.S.C., works from the premise that the slings and arrows, the sufferings of life shut down the heart, cover it, close it to fend off further wounds. This all-too-human response, however, also closes it to love—love of God, love of neighbor. He suggests that through the difficult process of exposing the heart, we can recover our ability to receive the love of Jesus and others, and to give love in return.
This retreat is meant to move during Advent toward the celebration of complete Love revealed in the Incarnation, so that we might hope to obtain authentic direction, comfort, protection, and answers from God by assuming this intentional place of vulnerability.
Raab presents a workable structure. He sources the retreat in scripture and exhorts the practitioner to read and reflect upon the Cycle A gospel readings of Advent for a given Sunday. He assists the process with significant imperatives as steps for each day: “Welcome the Stranger Called Silence, Discover Your Story Within the Word, Connect to the Waiting World, Respond to the Cry of the Prophets, and Pray.
He offers assistance through his own thoughts, providing examples for honest self-reflection in light of the gospel. Raab contributes interpretations of the prophets, while offering prompts with specific directions for thought and action. Practically, the format is very clear, with space for writing for each day in response to his guidance. His instructions lend themselves to faithful daily practice and the “pamphlet” sizing makes the entire retreat self-contained and easily managed.
Linda Showman is the Associate Director of Pastoral Formation, Mount Angel Seminary in St. Benedict, Oregon.
This text is published in the revised edition of, The Cross, Our Only Hope: Daily Reflections in the Holy Cross Tradition, Edited by Andrew Gawrych, CSC and Kevin Grove, CSC. Published by, Ave Maria Press, Notre Dame, Indiana. 2016 $17.95
November 9
Just what does a painter do? He studies his subject. He fills himself with it totally in order to reproduce it and, in a manner of speaking, to create it anew on canvas in a very close imitation of the subject’s features. Is it thus that you try to make Jesus Christ live again in you, to the point of his being totally remade or formed again in you? – Blessed Basil Moreau
I recently picked up a paintbrush for the first time in more than thirty years. My new teacher observed my grief from leaving my previous parish assignment. She suggested that I paint an image of a person who had significantly touched my heart in ministry. I slowly dipped my brush into a dab of paint and began to push the color onto a piece of paper.
The face of a man who still lives in a tent in the woods emerged in acrylic. Our parish had received him into the Church some ears ago. He still lives with depression, isolation, and unemployment; however, his face reveals the love of Jesus through his poverty and vulnerability.
People living with mental illness, generational poverty, or loneliness and disease show us the face of Jesus. We discover the tender face of Jesus through his mercy, love and forgiveness, not through our control, selfishness, and false power. People’s stories of suffering teach us about he search for faith in honest relationships as we gin to create genuine community.
In order to create genuine art, we need to be emptied of our judgments, cynical attitudes, and inability to see people for who they are. We also learn to see ourselves in the strokes of paint and dabs of color. In my case, all the years without creating art have passed for a reason. I am now vulnerable enough to see the colorful face of Jesus, who is still with us in the people and in me, all of us searching for hope and new life. – Ronald Patrick Raab, CSC
On the Margins from Mater Dei Radio, Portland, OR
Thirty-Second Sunday in Ordinary Time, November 6, 2016
(This broadcast does not have the usual opening and closing from the station)
Luke 20:27-38
We ultimately belong to God. No relationship here on earth outweighs God’s love and tenderness for our soul. In the end, in our death, we are God’s beloved.
Peter Curtin, 1954-2016
“Peter” Finger Painting: Ronald Raab, CSC
Peter Curtin died on All Souls’ Day. He attended daily Mass at Saint Andre Bessette Church (The Downtown Chapel) in Portland, Oregon for over 30 years. His life was devoted to Jesus and the Eucharist. He prayed fervently. He loved the staff and he changed our hearts.
Peter nicknamed me, “Ronnie the Kid”, when I met him in 2002. The name stuck for the eleven years we were together at the chapel. His name marked his seat in the last row of pews near the door. On most days, Peter was the one who presided over the actions, the harshness and the beauty of the people during Mass. He welcomed everyone through the chapel doors with his iconic, “I love you!”
Peter prayed out loud everyday during the Universal Prayers. He prayed for the things he needed such as the ability to take the cap off the shampoo when he would take a shower on Tuesdays. He prayed for people and his apartment, his dentist and his ability to get up on time in the morning. Peter and Jesus were linked together. His ability to be honest in prayer changed my life. I still cannot pray with such honesty and integrity in my own life. I am still learning from Peter. I really am the kid.
Peter offered the gifts of bread and wine at Mass every day. He offered his life to us in so many ways. He was one of two people who normally sat in adoration on Holy Thursday. He always questioned out loud whether or not his palm was blessed at the beginning of Mass on Palm Sunday. He was the first person to receive communion every day. After all, if you need communion like Peter did, you might as well be first. Every other person in the chapel always waited for him.
During Holy Week, Peter often sat in a chair outside the chapel and prayed in a loud, penetrating voice, “My God, my God, why have you abandoned me?” He told me once that he sang a song from Holy Thursday 385 times before the celebration. I know this is true. He loved the liturgy because he wanted with all his heart to praise God.
One year, Peter asked me to copy his holy papers. I had no idea what his request meant. So he brought about 80 pages of notes one day to the chapel. I asked him if he wanted me to copy these papers from a copy machine. He told me no. He wanted me to copy his notes in my own handwriting exactly as they appeared on each page. I had no idea why. So for the next few weeks I wrote his notes in my own penmanship on quality paper. I put the notes, mostly psalm responses and his own prayers, in a binder and gave them to him. He prayed from his notes for many years.
One year on the day before Christmas, Peter came up to the ambo as I finished reading the gospel. Just before my homily he asked me two times if he had diarrhea. Then he asked me if everything was going to be all right. He carried the emotions of the people within his heart and stumbled about how to deal with them. I had to muster real hope within my heart in the center of homelessness, addiction and mental illness to say, “Yes, Peter, everything will be all right”.
In recent years, his lifelong medications for his mental illness broke down his body. The last time I saw Peter was when he blessed me after my last Mass at the chapel on Pentecost 2013. Now I know for sure he will be all right in the arms of Jesus.
Peter, pray for us.
“Grief” Painting: Ronald Raab, CSC
“Zacchaeus and Jesus” Quick sketch: Ronald Raab, CSC
(Text: This weekend’s parish bulletin)
Dear Seekers of the Christ,
Luke’s Gospel (19:1-10) today tells the story of Zacchaeus, who climbed a sycamore tree to see Jesus. Zacchaeus was not only short in stature, but also short in respect among the people in his community because he was a tax collector. However, God had planted within his heart this great desire to see Jesus. He wished to lay his eyes on the One who could forgive him, heal him and offer him a new place within his community.
Jesus noticed Zacchaeus and wanted to forgive him. He sought Zacchaeus out by inviting himself to Zacchaeus’ house. Of course, the people griped about this. They were taken aback that Jesus would eat with a sinner.
This text invites us to let go of our judgments and our misconceptions. So often we still think that faith and the Church are for the rich, the well mannered, the educated and the sinless. In fact, Jesus comes to us just as we are: broken, confused, anxious, ill adjusted, and worried. Even after all of these generations, we still cannot believe that Jesus seeks after us, just as we are.
Zacchaeus went to great heights to find Jesus. The question that we face is: “To what heights are we willing to go to see Jesus?” I invite you to consider this in your prayer this week. There are very few of you who will read this question in this bulletin. However, those of you who do, already have the desire to find Jesus by exploring your own mind and heart to discover how you relate to Jesus Christ. Explore, run, climb, sit in silence, read, shout, go to confession or do something to find your heart’s desire this week. Jesus is waiting for you and wants to go to your house to find you. His love is waiting for you right where you are.
This week the Church celebrates the great feast of All Saints on November 1. This is a holy day for us. It is a time to reflect on the role models of our faith and how we live the message of Jesus’ passion, death and resurrection. Mass times: October 31– OLPH at 7:00 pm; November 1- Sacred Heart at 8:00 am, 12:10 pm and 7:00 pm. Holy Rosary at 6:30 pm. The following day, November 2, the Church remembers All Souls. Mass on that day will be 8:00 am at Sacred Heart.
On All Souls, Wednesday November 2, I will offer a morning of reflection from 9:00-10:30 am. I will reflect on All Souls as well as the gospels for the month of November to close out our liturgical year. Join me for this morning of prayer and reflection.
Blessings,
Fr. Ron
Broken But Not Divided 