Grace of Gratefulness

Thank You God,

For the days when the bright sky’s light shines clarity into our senses, when the tangled tips of the trees cut bold outlines against the luminous dome, massaging our eyes with deep royal hues.

Thank You God,

For the days when the rustling of a coat, the keyboard’s clickety-clack, and the unseen footsteps of a fellow traveler soothe our ears like the sweetest music.

Thank You God,

For the days when creation brightens, happiness meets us—or perhaps we are given the freshness to recognize the abundance You offer us, day, after day, after day, after day, after day, after day, after day.

Love,

Joe

Thoughts from January

If you've ever seen a dream
Move from mind to real thing,
You know the great illusion, then,
That empty dreams can bring.

If you focus on your own,
Then the show gets dull, and fast.
But sing a chorus role for once—
By God, your peace will last.

Wicked Winter's dreary heart
Threatens cold and icy days;
But humble acts and gratitude
Will summon warmer rays.

Free Will and Confidence

I can't speak for you, dear reader, (assuming there is a reader to describe as dear), but I know that the happiest moments of my life have been characterized by more than just happiness; they are always accompanied by a deep-seated sense of confidence, akin to rushing water. Happiness doesn't seem to last, but why should confidence ever leave us? Happiness is an emotion, but confidence is a choice. Happiness is fickle like the weather, but confidence is as freely chosen as the coat we put on in the morning.

Unfortunately, confidence is not an easy choice. Confidence demands effort, and occasionally means butting heads with genuine opponents or facing up to over-inflated masks of ego. Either way, it means we have to step out of the comfort zone.

Human instinct tends toward safety and comfort. It's just what we prefer. This is not a curse, but it does force us to put some effort into how we live our lives.

Confidence is a choice, but a choice that our nature pushes us away from. And here is where the trump card comes in, that wonderful aspect of humanity that always comes in to save us when we've worked ourselves into a self-reflective quandary about our nature. Ladies and Gentlemen, I present to you, FREE WILL. Yes, we are endowed with free will, which implies that, at least in theory, we are capable of complete self-control.

Although we do not take advantage of this fact nearly as much as we could/should, the fact remains that in every moment, we are presented with a choice—the choice of what kind of person we want to be. We can be heroes or heels, champions or chick-a-dees, mavericks or mice. Who do you choose to be? Every moment demands a response to this question. If we ever feel a lack of confidence (and as was said, our nature tends toward that), all we need to do is visualize the person we want to be, and realize that a conscious choice on our part will transform us into that person.

One final word of warning: confidence does not come from within ourselves. The choice to change, the free will that gives us the chance to change ourselves, is a gift from above. And once we do choose the road less travelled, the strength to walk it does not come from our own metaphorical muscles. Confidence comes from God alone! The Spirit is the rushing water that fills our hearts and minds, leading us to our destination. Without a firm foundation in the One Who laid the earth's foundations, our towers will topple pretty fast. It all starts with a firm trust and wonder at the power and love of our unfailing, superactive Father in Heaven. I'd say more, but I'd prefer to share the words of Jesus. No, not the Christ, not this time. (Not that guy who works at Toys R Us, either.) I'm talking about Jesus, son of Eleazar, son of Sirach--a.k.a. author of the Book of Sirach:

"Lively is the courage of those who fear the LORD, for they put their hope in their savior; He who fears the LORD is never alarmed, never afraid; for the LORD is his hope...."

And here's where the happiness comes in:

"He buoys up the spirits, brings a sparkle to the eyes, gives health and life and blessing. "

--Sirach 34:14-15, 17--

Stay strong!

Confidently,
Joezilla

A Sonnett to Pizza, lovingly entitled: "Pizza Mia."

I wrote this sonnett in a Renaissance Poetry class, and though my memory now fails me as to the details, yet I do remember something about a pizza-filled review session which I would not be able to attend. Regardless, it was evidently inspired by the throes of a passionate hunger for pizza. Enjoy!

~

PIZZA MIA.

Away with all this talk of studied verse,
For each new word reminds me of my curse:
I see the pepperoni, never mine;
And cheese, possessed of such a flavor fine—
my splendid, absent mozzarella wine—
O Pizza dear, for you alone I pine!

Some blessed day this May I may consume you
And in my darkened labyrinth entomb you.
But 'til the sun ariseth on that morn,
I rub my vacant cavity, forlorn.
This longing wills that I had ne'er been born,
But here, I think, I am, and I am torn.
If given minutes, months, or million years,
Pizza—you would quench my hungry tears.

HoBoy!

Do you have any weaknesses? Something that makes you uncomfortable or uncertain, that freezes your better self in its tracks and calls you with a siren’s song to a disappointing mediocrity? Of course you do. So do I. We all have them. It’s just a matter of figuring out what it is. Take Superman, for example. He can fly around downtown (if I may borrow Matchbox 20’s verbiage), leap over buildings in a single bound, and yada yada yada--but put him in front of a green Kryptonite stone and he’s about as strong as Sammy Sosa without his steroids. That poor sap, Superman--he has a glaring weakness, and he can’t get rid of it. Luckily for us, we are nothing like Superman. We can fix our weaknesses.

Up until very recently, hobos were one of my weaknesses. It’s true. Speaking in front of a crowd, I could handle. Complaining at a restaurant, not a problem--and sometimes even a pleasure. But dealing with a hobo? Yikes! If a hobo on the street asked me for money, my mind would freeze and I would go into deer-in-the-headlights mode (okay, perhaps I’m exaggerating a bit, but “deer-in-the-headlights mode” is a wonderful phrase, and I had to include it). In all seriousness, though, such a situation, common as it is in urban areas, was one of uncertainty and discomfort. On one hand, we have the societal (and in some ways religious) push toward simple acts of charity, which is often represented as giving money to the poor folks in the streets. Although this is a shallow characterization (more on that later), it is nonetheless the message we often see in movies and hear in sermons. People like to think of giving monetary handouts as a righteous act.

On the other hand, there is the common sense view which many (or perhaps most) of us were raised with--people begging for handouts on the street need money for booze and/or drugs; or, at the very least, they are lazy fools who could just as easily take orders at McDonald’s as they take handouts at State and Madison (to paraphrase Michael Jordan’s provocative anecdote).

Sometimes this common sense view is confirmed in comically obvious ways--such as the case of the young man (in the prime of his life, no kidding) who trudges through traffic daily at the same intersection, year-round, with a sign that says “Please help me, God bless you.” It would seem obvious to everyone except the man himself that his daily activity is both strenuous and risky--and the honest occupation of coalminer would not only fulfill both of these criteria, but it would also yield a steady paycheck and a peaceful intersection. Yet there he is, and there he remains to this day.

But some hobos are convincing (and, no doubt, some are completely kosher). But that’s just the problem--the stakes in this game are higher than they seem. As wonderful as it is to help a man in honest need, that’s how horrible an act it is to give money to an addict. In such a case, we are actively assisting a destructive habit-- bringing the poor soul one step closer to oblivion! If that’s charity, then I missed something in Sunday school.

The point is, we cannot just give money to people. We might be doing them a huge disservice, far greater than ignoring or refusing them, in doing so. The risk of someone’s life is too great to play around with. Heartless as it sounds, there is no other way.

So here’s the question: why is it so hard to refuse? A recent situation forced me to face the issue once and for all. I was walking to the car after eating a wonderful lunch with my Mom, when a man in a heavy coat (in retrospect I should’ve known, but I didn’t take a good look at it at first) asked me if I could spare a few dollars for gas (in retrospect I should’ve known how many holes there were in that kind of story, but remember? by this time I was already in idiot mode). Hmm. I had about 4 seconds to respond…what to say? I wasn’t actually going to give him any money--most of the money in my wallet was borrowed from my Mom and was not mine to give--and regardless of that, I didn’t want to risk a theft. No question there. I wouldn't give him any money. But how to say no? I hummed and hawed for a moment, then rattled off some lame excuse about my Mom having all the money. Feeling slightly shameful (which I’m now ashamed to admit), I parted by saying “I hope you find some, though.” Then I realized that I was in the presence of an angel.
No, it wasn’t the panhandler. That’s how it usually gets shown in movies, I grant you (and Hebrews 13:2 should by no means be taken lightly), but in real life it was the exact reverse for me--the angel took the form of a blond-haired female passerby of about 35, who brazenly addressed him after my comment by saying “And I also hope you find somewhere to work, because you come here to beg every day!” I got into the car and processed what I’d just seen. First, I couldn’t believe that woman’s guts--I didn’t know they made people that confident anymore. I admired that. It was also at that moment when I realized the thinness of the hobo’s request, and the absurdity of the shame I’d felt. To have the man’s chicanery exposed with such blunt words of witness was like a blow to the head--except it felt great. My illusions were gone!

I say that that woman was an angel, because she lifted the wool of ignorance and deceit from my eyes so that I could see the truth within this one isolated situation. In seeing the truth, I realized that my shame was totally unwarranted--the man was proven to be a con-artist! Even if he had been on the level, shame would not have been a good response. I had my reasons not to give, and that should be enough for anyone--especially myself! I knew then and there that a confident response of “no” would have sufficed, and would have been the proper way to retain my dignity (which, the way I see it, I flushed down the toilet in this situation).
Most important of all, it should be realized that the only proper attitude of a panhandler ought to be one of the sincerest and humblest entreaty. Money, after all, is not easily earned in this world, and to receive it as a free gift from a stranger is not only a rare, but almost a miraculous occurrence. Shaking a cup, or halfheartedly muttering “God bless you” just doesn’t cut it for me. A panhandler ought to realize the flabbergasting fortune of his situation, notwithstanding his dire straits--he is alive, and (in most cases) possesses the opportunity to interact with the wider world (an opportunity widely sought-after in lonely nursing home rooms and hospital beds across the world). Seriously. They have no place asking someone else for a handout, so they ought to be amazed and overjoyed at the mere fact that anyone even responds to them. At presstime, such behavior has not yet been observed in any hobo. And as for me: Shame? Are you kidding me? Well, I know one thing: I wasn’t kidding when I acted like a fool in that parking lot.

I realized that day, thanks to the intervention of the “angel” (who actually happened to be a salon stylist who worked in the same complex where I’d been dining, and so was privy to the hobo’s daily occupation in the parking lot), that my weakness happened to be hobos. And unlike Superman, my weakness was dissolved with a simple and conscious act of the will (along with some more in-depth reflection…evidenced by this blog post). From now on, if I am accosted by a panhandler, I will not give them money, and will be proud of it. If I respond to them, it will be to say, quite simply, “No.” I simply will not. If I am ill-judged at the end of time for adopting this stance, I will hang my head in remorse before my Lord--and without a doubt, my shame will be justified. But I’m betting against that ending. I think a weakness has been obliterated--and that’s good enough for me!

2 Letters to the Editor

"The wise man speaks because he has something to say. The fool speaks because he has to say something." —Plato

I was eating lunch at the University Student Center today and was graced by the presence of a silent procession of self-righteousness—a group of four students stalked through the dining area wearing poster-sized signs. These signs proclaimed the angst of various minority groups through single-sentence statements about their troubles. I tend to feel a negative gut-reaction toward these types of people; given the opportunities they're afforded at a university, you would think they could find better ways to spend their time than carrying around signs—particularly signs stating ideologies that most of their student audience already receives in class, anyway. What was most striking about these people, though—far more than the usual protest's lack of effectiveness—was their lack of a purpose. What exactly were they protesting against? I soon began formulating a letter I could write to the student paper pointing this out. It was going to go something like this:

"I encountered the epitome of self-righteous self-centeredness today at the University Center. Protesters silently walked the dining rooms, proclaiming messages that no one asked to hear, with no clear purpose. The question they evidently needed to hear was 'Why are you saying all this?' How sad it is that such people are devoting their vast capabilities as human beings toward such vain and useless endeavors; they are rebels without a cause, whose deepest allegiance is not to any cause, but the projections of their own image."

Yes. Then I thought for a few more minutes, and another mental letter formulated in my mind, this letter not addressed to the student newspaper, but to myself:

"You encountered the epitome of self-righteous self-centeredness today at the University Center. You started writing a letter about those protesters—a letter proclaiming a message that no one asked to hear, and with no clear purpose. The question you need to hear is not 'Why are you saying all this,' but 'What makes you think people care?' How sad it would be if a person like you devoted his vast capabilities as a human being toward such a vain and useless endeavor; you would be a rebel without a cause, whose deepest allegiance is not to any cause, but the projections of his own image."

I knew it was either one letter or the other. And seeing the choice of what kind of person I could be laid out before me so neatly, I promptly chose the latter letter. Thank God!

Courage to Disagree Grants Ability to See

I recently heard the argument put forth that the early Church permitted female priests, but that this changed at the Council of Nicea. A corollary premise to this theory (which is becoming more absurd and outlandish even as I restate it here) is that Scripture recounts a lack of female leadership in the Church because the writings were gathered by men who wished to preserve their own religious authority.

This view makes a fundamental logical error. It assumes that Church leadership was dominated by males who “rewrote history” in order to exclude the female leaders. But the whole point of the argument was to expose the fiction of the male-dominated Church leadership! Either the Church was dominated by males, who rewrote history, or it was not--in which case the males wouldn’t have been powerful enough to rewrite history. Think about it for a moment; if such a deception were to take place, would there not be a single shred of evidence testifying to such a fact? There is nothing; no ancient traditions, no textual testimonies, nothing.

Furthermore, are we to believe that, in this imaginary situation, not one man stood with these oppressed female priests? Such unanimity of opinion is rather striking…and rather unbelievable.

The only possible impetus for pursuing this as a hypothesis is wishful thinking. And the fact that logic, history, and common sense mount a screaming testimony against it is a rather strong justification for rejecting it as absurd.