Showing posts with label Sacred Heart. Show all posts

All Downhill From Here!

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas!
 
lots of sources!
Well, after staying up until (almost) 4AM yesterday, I finally got my metaphysics paper done and turned it in yesterday afternoon (it was a great feeling!).  I think the paper turned out pretty good in the end.  Earlier this week I was spending pretty much all my free time on that paper and it just wasn't coming together how I wanted it to.  I was talking about teleology (that things, particularly humans, have ends, in our case, happiness in God) and this allows morality/ethics to exist.  Basically, without teleology, everybody has to figure out their own end (power, money, pleasure, work, whatever), and for this reason (along with some other logical/metaphysical reasons) teleology must exist and ethics must be based on it.  It was a really cool paper and unfortunately this summary doesn't do the topic justice (my paper didn't either I imagine), but I am really glad that I finally found the sources that I needed to finish the paper off. 
 
I still have to finish up the senior seminar paper, something that I will work on for the next hour or so before meeting with Dr. Denz (the professor for that class).  Hopefully he's happy with my (very) rough draft that I gave him a few weeks back. 
 
Next week I have all the typical finals - Monday: calculus and moral issues (neither will be easy, but shouldn't be impossible either), Tuesday: Augustine and Aquinas (again, it'll take studying, but I'll be ready), Wednesday: senior seminar and psychology (senior sem. is a take-home, but will probably be one of my hardest finals, psychology is a presentation and should be easy), and Thursday: metaphysics (tough, but should go alright).  I am very glad that my finals are spaced out over the week - usually I'd want to get them done as quickly as possible, but all my classes are tough this semester, so I am glad that I should have enough time to study before each one.
 
the holly tree in Brute's courtyard
Of course, the fun doesn't stop just because everybody is getting ready for finals!  This afternoon we are going to play some football (in the snow!), and (recap from the previous post) this evening we have the first-ever Brute talent show.  The Springfield guys will be doing something, and there are a bunch of other guys who will be showing off as well.  It should be awesome!  Tomorrow there are a bunch of us going caroling at a Catholic nursing home (actually the same one that Ray and I have for our ministry) - it was a blast last year, and this year, I'm sure, won't be any different.   On Sunday evening I'm going with some guys to Cincinnati for "lessons and carols", which is some sort of Advent/Christmas concert put on by the seminary up there.
 
Fr. Joe said something quite profound in his homily this morning.  He said that Advent is a time to deepen our faith and, like the blind men in the Gospel this morning, ask Jesus to heal the places within our soul that are broken, hurt, warped, or suffering.  This same faith must then give us the insight to see our life (physically and spiritually) as it really is, a gift from God, and then give our lives back to God.  To cultivate those talents, abilities, and blessings that we have been given, and use them for the greater glory of God and the good of all His creation.  Obviously, my summary is lacking the awesomeness and persuasion that father included in his homily, but my brain is a bit fried from the past few days...
 
I hope you have all had a good (almost) first week of Advent.  I hope to get back to blogging more frequently once I knock out these finals.  May the mercy and love of the Sacred Heart enflame you with His joy, peace, love, and energy on this first Friday, especially in this beautiful season of Advent.

Oh, happy feast of St. Nicholas!

Also, I'm going to post some videos that I've found during this week (they're cool and I won't have time to post something more substantial...)

Make My Heart Like Unto Thine - get ready for humility

I don't know about all of you, but it sure seems like many, many, things seem to line up at once in the spiritual journey.  I guess God knows how "deaf" I am at times, and makes it glaringly obvious when I need to be working on something.  About a month ago, a priest recommended that I pray each morning "Make my heart like unto thine" to Jesus.  Basically, to accept His will in my life, and to resign myself to doing whatever came up that day to Him.  As a previous post had indicated the combination of work and Spanish left me with little free time (at least Monday-Friday) and I wasn't really accepting this as God's will for this summer.  Anyway, I had certainly heard the phrase before, but I hadn't (to use a terrible pun) taken it to heart.  Of course, shortly thereafter I heard (and then remembered) the first half of the phrase: "Jesus meek and humble of heart".  I don't know about you, but whenever I pray for humility, I seem to always get it.  You know, you think you are good at something and then you totally screw it up. 

On the second to last day of work I was carting around knocking out some of the last LOTO cabinets.  Before going out I had gotten the keys necessary to get into them, and it just so happened that this day I had 5 different keys.  Most of the previous times that I went out I only had 2 or 3 keys, but this day the cabinets that I needed to get into used 5 different keys.  Oh well, no big deal, off I went...  All the cabinets this day were "cooperating" so I was knocking out some of the last locks, replacing worn tags, etc., but after each cabinet I was very careful to check and make sure that I had all the keys.  They were all separate, and I usually had to go  through a few of them before I found the one that would work on this cabinet, so I made sure to count them after finishing each cabinet to make sure I hadn't dropped one (or left it in the cabinet, or whatever).  Anyway, on the last cabinet, I finished it up, counted my keys, and hopped back on the golf cart.  This particular department has the most awkward way of getting into it, and to get the cart out you pretty much have to back up this ramp, across another ramp, and then do a turn-about thing on the main thoroughfare (which has forklifts careening around).  Basically, it was a tricky spot for maneuvering the golf cart, so I was slowly backing my way up this ramp when, who should appear, but my boss (of course...) in his own golf cart coming down the ramp that I was trying to back up.  He graciously let me past and off I went back to the safety department happy that I hadn't hit my boss in the golf cart, that I had knocked out a few more issues, and I only had like 20 minutes before I was done for the day.
To my absolute horror (I am sweating right now thinking about it, though that may be my laptop...), when I got back to the safety department I only had 4 keys.  I was pretty much terrified, I had no idea if there were spares of these keys someplace, and even if they were - you can't just have anybody pick up the key to this cabinet and do whatever they want.  It was an absolute disaster, a total, complete, massive calamity.  Anyway, with heart pounding, I began to retrace my steps.  I had been all over the plant that afternoon, and the last time that I would have used that key was a few hours ago.  Of course, I had thought that I had checked all the keys after each department, but what if I hadn't?  It could be absolutely anywhere in this massive complex, which I still didn't understand, of different buildings, lines, machines, and offices.   That one key could be anywhere!  Anyway, back to the story, I retraced my steps back to the cart - nothing, back through the department that I last drove through - nothing, back across the parking lot - nothing, into the maintenance building - nothing.  And then the disaster got worse, I was about to check the last department that I had been to, where I had thought that I had counted all 5 keys, and there was my boss's golf cart.  He was in that department...  I scanned the plant floor, hoping that the key was somewhere, anywhere, but nothing.  I had to walk into that department and search for this key, right in front of my boss.  So, in I marched.  "hey Dominic, how's it going?" - "Um" gulp "ok..."  I nonchalantly (yeah right) looked on the table, in the trash can, and with a huge sigh of relief  spotted the key.  It was laying 6 inches from where my boss was sitting.  I picked it up - he noted "ah, lost a key, eh?" - "yeah..." - "don't do it again..."  I was so happy to see that key - thank goodness I found it, but did my boss have to be there?  I hadn't ever seen him before while out an about.  Yet, the one time that I lost a key (once!), he is sitting on top of it...  

Last year, in a somewhat related topic, at the winter seminarian get-together (today happens to be the summer one) the bishop had us think about a spiritual goal.  (I don't remember the exact exercise, but it was something like that.) Anyway, I came up with wanting to be a "man after God's own heart" - you know, the phrase said about David.  So I was thinking about how similar this phrase is to making my heart like unto Jesus' and I see an obvious similarity - humility.  Think about David, here is this young kid, kills Goliath by trusting in God,  anointed king of Israel, winning battles left and right, everything that he could want in the world, and yet, has a pretty good relationship with God - what a life!  Then he sins with Bathsheba, and kills Uriah to hide it.  Then, instead of the sin being hidden Nathan shows up, gives him that story about the rich man stealing the poor man's lamb, and David is like "that man should be put to death!" (I am definitely paraphrasing).  Then Nathan is like "that man is you" (again my paraphrasing from the Old Testament from memory).  David, of course, is humiliated - his "hidden" sin, isn't so hidden anymore.  But here's the thing, instead of being proud and arrogant, he humbles himself before God and begs for forgiveness.

The "man after God's own heart" stays that way because he is humble.  Much like myself, I think everything is going great, and WHAM! I'm hit with some problem.  I think God is telling me - rely on Him, trust Him, let Him work in my life.  In Psalm 51:10 David says "Create a clean heart in me, O God, and renew in me a steadfast spirit".  (paraphrase)  These moments of humiliation can be super-naturalized into moments to grow in the virtue of humility.  Times when we stumble can lead to repentance (confession is pretty humbling for good reason), times when we make a mistake can lead to greater reliance and trust in God (St. Anthony's intercession really came through for me!), etc.  Humility, as I heard on the Catholic Answers podcast the other day (which are fantastic, by the way), is very much related to living truthfully.  It isn't being a "door mat" that everybody else can walk across - poor, little me, I can't do anything... (NOT!), it is acknowledging before other people, and especially God that we are good at some things, and that we aren't good at others.  Of course, in our relationship with God, this involves both repentance for our sins and thankfulness for our blessings, both of which are a form of trust and reliance upon Him.  


Jesus meek and humble of heart, make my heart like unto thine 
repentant, thankful, trusting, loving, merciful, prayerful