Shielded from Grace

Holy Cow!  It has been almost two months since my last post.  To be honest, I've had writers block.  Not to many ideas.  Not a whole lot of time to devote to writing either.  My prayer life has been abysmal.  And guess what? I feel like I'm in the desert.  If you look at this post, I think I'd be somewhere near the bottom of the cosine.  Do you think there is any coincidence?

For me, being in tune with the Father starts with a good prayer life.  It is the foundation on which all things are built.  The best results for me are when I start and end the day in prayer.

With the exception of going to Mass every week, and bible study when my business travel allows, I have not been too good a son to the Father nor a good brother to the Son.  In a way, I think that not having a good prayer life and/or not participating in the sacraments shields you from the Grace of God.  In much the same way as a child/teenager shuts themselves in their room and locks the door.  They are trying to shut out their parents.  It is the only place that they can go and (hopefully) be alone.  They are shielding themselves from their parents and what they consider prying questions or interference from their parents.

But the question is, why do we want to shut out the Father and his grace?  I think with me it just starts with being tired and frustrated with work and skipping prayer once.  If we don't have enough discipline to get back on track, we hit the downward slope of the cosine curve.  Hopefully we realize where we are going and get back on track.

Thankfully, the Good Shepherd is always glad to have us back in the fold.

Blessings

Tim

Prayer for Patience

I have a problem with patience. There is nothing wrong with patience, I just don't have enough of it. Through the Father, all things are possible. During my prayers, I ask for help with patience. One day, I was struck with the thought that I need to write a prayer for patience. Here is what I came up with. Be gentle.

My Father,
only through you are all things possible.

By your Grace, I am made whole.
You complete me.

Help me to recall
- the joyful noise that was their first cry.
- the unconditional love I felt when I first held them.
- the joy and pride in each small accomplishment.

Help me to remember that they are a precious gift from you. Left in my care for what seems like a lifetime but is gone in the blink of an eye.

That however impatient or angry that I may be with them, they will learn from my words and actions. Help me to remember that by teaching them these things, I am perpetuating that which must stop.

Help me to remember that I am called to protect, teach, and above all, love them as you love me.

Help me to unshackle myself from
- the stress and fatigue of the work day.
- the crush of the pressure from the World.
- the anxiety from the uncertainty of these tough economic times.

Father, I know that through you, all things are possible. Complete me with the grace of patience and perspective so that I may fulfill my sacred duty as husband and father.

Lord Jesus, pray for me.
Your Holiness JP II, pray for me.
St. Joseph, pray for me

Amen

Blessings

Tim

Updated: Foot Washing. No Job to Small for Our God.

This post is actually an update of a post from earlier today.  I was fortunate enough to attend the Holy Thursday Mass. Our assistant pastor gave a great homily that provided an additional insight.  I got another insight the repose of the blessed sacrament, I was reading William Barclay's commentary concerning the footwashing.  The additional info is in italics.

The Holy Land is a dusty place.  Imagine how dirty your feet would be if you walked around in sandals, all the time. When going into someone's home, a slave or a servant of the owner would wash your feet. If there wasn't a servant, the homeowner would wash your feet. In the case of Jesus and the disciples, if there wasn't a servant or homeowner about, the disciples probably took turns. It would be unprecedented if a rabbi washed the feet of his disciples and a major breach of etiquette if a guest were to wash the feet of others.

William Barclay, in his commentary on the Gospel of John, points to Luke 22:24 as another potential reason for performing the foot washing.  In this passage, a dispute arose amongst the disciples about who would be the greatest. Perhaps they no one was willing to do the washing before entering into the building for the Passover meal?  Jesus takes things into his own hands and does what none of them are willing to do.

Another interesting thing about the footwashing that our assistant pastor brought up concerns what Jesus and his disciples are celebrating?  The Passover.  What is the Passover all about?  Celebrating their physical delivery from slavery under the Egyptians.  What did Jesus do, he delivered us from the slavery of our sin, our sickness, our blindness.  The Lord who has set us free from slavery has become the slave to his disciples.

What an example the Lord has set for us.

So when he had washed their feet (and) put his garments back on and reclined at table again, he said to them, "Do you realize what I have done for you? You call me 'teacher' and 'master,' and rightly so, for indeed I am. If I, therefore, the master and teacher, have washed your feet, you ought to wash one another's feet. I have given you a model to follow, so that as I have done for you, you should also do. Amen, amen, I say to you, no slave is greater than his master nor any messenger greater than the one who sent him. If you understand this, blessed are you if you do it."

John 13:12-17

God humbled himself by coming as a human to share in our experience. He could have come as an earthly king. Instead he came as a servant to set an example for us all. What does that say about his Love for us? What an awesome God.

Blessings to you

Tim

Foot Washing. No Job to Small for Our God.

The Holy Land is a dusty place.  Imagine how dirty your feet would be if you walked around in sandals, all the time.

When going into someone's home, a slave or a servant of the owner would wash your feet. If there wasn't a servant, the homeowner would wash your feet. It would be unprecedented if a rabbi washed the feet of his disciples and a major breach of etiquette if a guest were to wash the feet of others.

What an example the Lord has set for us.

So when he had washed their feet (and) put his garments back on and reclined at table again, he said to them, "Do you realize what I have done for you? You call me 'teacher' and 'master,' and rightly so, for indeed I am. If I, therefore, the master and teacher, have washed your feet, you ought to wash one another's feet. I have given you a model to follow, so that as I have done for you, you should also do. Amen, amen, I say to you, no slave is greater than his master nor any messenger greater than the one who sent him. If you understand this, blessed are you if you do it."

John 13:12-17

God humbled himself by coming as a human to share in our experience. He could have come as an earthly king. Instead he came as a servant to set an example for us all. What does that say about his Love for us? What an awesome God.

Blessings to you

Tim

How I felt after my conversion. Forgiveness and Thankfulness

I was watching the "Passion of the Christ" recently.  This scene speaks to me.  This is how I felt after my conversion.

Not a slave bowing down to a master. But as someone reaching out in supreme thankfulness for the realization that Jesus has come to help us to realize that we are forgiven and the Father loves us so much that he sent his only Son.

Our Father and his only Son are awesome.

Blessings

Tim

To Love and Serve the Lord

1. We were made to love and serve the Lord.
2. We are given a vocation. Either to love and serve the Lord as a religious or love and serve the Lord as a husband and father.

As a husband and father, how am I to love and serve the Lord? To love my wife and children as the Father and his only Son have loved and continue to love me. Ultimately, to boil it down, my job, my vocation, how I am able to love and serve the Lord, my reason for existence is to ensure that my children are able to love and serve the Lord.

QED

Tim

God is Good

I was in Finland last week.  Intercontinental travel, especially short trips can be tough because your body clock gets all out of whack.  Case in point, no matter what time I went to bed last week, I woke up at 4am Finnish time.  This made for some very long days!

While in Finland, I had the opportunity to discuss Christ with someone.  Over several hours we were able to share our thoughts and feelings about our faith. He was a fellow engineer with a young daugher who believes as I do. That the more you analyze and put creation under a microscope, the more you have to realize that there is a creator.

We also talked at great length about the relationship we have with the Father and how this mirrors our relationship with our children.  It is so good to meet people that share your beliefs.  It is even better when you are able to talk about those beliefs together.

God is Good.

Blessings

Tim

Hell as the absence of the Father and his only Son

The God of Fear in the Old Testament is the God of Punishment. If you are sinful and don't repent you are punished with hell. The people at the time needed this message. The Father was the God of tough love because we needed it.

I bounce back and forth between the Old and the New. Lately, I've been thinking more New Testament. God is Love, as embodied by Jesus. Jesus shows us the mind of God and I think we can take our cue from him. He does not force us to follow. Quite the contrary, he tells how tough it will be. It is our choice to conform ourselves to his will and, in so doing, loving one another.

In this plane of existence, we are surrounded by God, we choose how much of his grace penetrates into our life. Either a little or a lot.

To that end, I think of hell as the complete absence of God and his Grace. No beauty. No truth. No love. Nothing. Yet, it is our choice to make that happen.

Yet the catechism tells us that Hell is a very real place. So there must be a place where all the souls who choose to shut the Father out of their existence go. So what are we to make of the torment we are told we face? I would think that not being within the presence of the Father, Son, and their grace would be enough. What is the torment then?

Is the source of torment from souls that have shut the Father out tormenting the weaker ones due to the their frustration and helplessness that they feel from being shut out from the Father based upon their own decisions. Retribution because they have no one else to blame?

Just wondering. Based upon a comment exchange on this post.

Blessings

tim

Loving the Father

Posted during a break taken while doing some work at a local coffee place.

How do we love the Father?  For the longest time I didn't feel love for the Father or Jesus.  Why, because the feelings I had for them did not feel like what I felt for my wife and kids or my parents.

I'd sit in my bible study and here folks talk about how in love with Jesus they are and you could tell from their sincerity that what they were saying was more than words and grandstanding.  They were in love.  I kept wondering to myself, why don't I feel that?  Where is the great burning in my heart for Jesus and the Father?

But I'm coming to realize, that through my spiritual journey and the cosine post from the other day, that we need to put our shields up to the outside world and put down our shields to the grace and peace of the Father and Jesus.

How is this done? At least for me it is continually trying to be "in the Spirit" through spiritual exercises such as prayer, bible study, frequenting the sacraments, Mass, etc.

Blessings

Tim

"My soul is sorrowful even to death."

I read this story and "my soul is sorrowful even to death."  It aches.  Granted the baby was born so premature that it may not have survived.  But they didn't even try...

All I can think about...to say...to pray is:  Father I am sorry.  I'm sorry we have lost our way.  I'm sorry that we have so objectified all that you created that the only thing that matters is our own wishes, desires, our own happiness. Why don't we understand that only through conforming our will to Yours will we ever be happy?  I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry. Forgive us.  Forgive me for not doing enough.

Pray that we can all do a little more.

Tim

Pulling on the Father's Arm

Note:  the genesis of this post came from something that happened to me before I started Blogging.

One day I was working on the computer. Well all right, I wasn't actually working. I was on Facebook catching up with what was going on with my friends.  Anybody who is on Facebook knows that it can be addictive. There seems to be a deep seated desire within us to want to be up to date with what is going on in each others lives as well as to let everyone know what you are doing.

It was after dinner and the girls were running around the house playing. My youngest came up to me, started pulling on my arm and said "Daddy, Daddy! Play Monster Chase!"  Monster Chase is a simple game where I basically chase after them with my arms up in the air like Frankenstein and growling like some ferocious monster. Other times I chase after them as "Grandpa Pants Monster" where I hike up my pants over my belly button with my shirt tucked in. After chasing them for some time I will either tackle and tickle them for a while or let them tackle and tickle me. It is great fun.

Anyways, it had been a long day and I was feeling selfish. I did something in retrospect that was very foolish and regret. I brushed them off and said "Not now." I really have no excuse for my behavior. Thinking back, I should have dropped what I was doing and started chasing them around. I do not want to set an example for them that it is ok to "blow off" your children.

Does the Father do that when we are in prayer or carried away in the Spirit so much that we are pulling on his arm to enjoy his presence and love?  Of course not.  A couple examples in Scripture come to mind. The Annointing in Bethany (John 12:1-8) and Mark 10:13-16. Now I realize that the passage Mark has other theological implications, but it also me that even though the Lord was busy trying to save the world, he could still make time for kids.

Since then I have made a concerted effort to make sure that I don't miss out on these opportunities.  But it is tough.  With all of our obligations and work and responsibilities.

I just don't want them to know that every moment with them should be peace and joy.

Blessings to you all.

Tim

Does the Father Beam with Pride?

Does the Father Beam with pride when we do something that is according to his will? How about when we are baptized or after our first Sacrament of Reconciliation and Eucharist? What about when we are confirmed or have a reconversion that brings us back into his Grace? Does discovering our true vocation give him a warm feeling from the fact that our actions will bring him glory?

Why am I asking this? Because of the pride I feel whenever one of our daughters hits a milestone in their development. It is these milestones, both small and large, which really make parenting a joy. I'm writing this a couple of weeks after our oldest, Emily, that did something that made me extremely proud. Let me explain.

Emily has a couple of jobs to do when she gets up in the morning. They need to be completed before coming down to breakfast or climbing into bed with Mommy and Daddy. These jobs are nothing major:  make her bed and give the cats fresh water. Giving the cats fresh water is an important one because she would like her own kitten and she is trying to prove to us that she can be responsible.

Well, Sunday morning was very cold here in the Pacific Northwest. I heard her get up and give the cats some fresh water and I expected to her to make a beeline for our bed. After about 10 minutes, she was a no show.  Concerned, I got out of bed and walked over to her room. I opened the door to her room, and there she is lying on her 95% made bed, covered with a blanket.  "What are you doing?" I asked.

"It's cold, I'm warming up", she said.

"Why didn't you come into bed with Mommy and Daddy?"

"I didn't finish my jobs."

I was stunned and couldn't have been more proud. My little girl was showing responsibility. She was starting to understand the difference between knowing what she had to do and what she wanted to do.

I scooped her up, gave her a big hug, carried her into our room, and plopped her on our bed so that she could snuggle up with us.  (The only thing she hadn't done was putting her stuffed animals in place. Good enough in Daddy's eyes.)

So does the Father beam with pride when we hit a milestone in our faith journey? When we are baptized, confirmed, have our first reconciliation, and our First Eucharist? What about a conversion? What about when we conform ourselves to His will? How about the little things like this? Is he looking at the both of us with a smile happy that we are doing ok, learning from each other?

Blessings to you all.

Tim

Blessed are those...

Blessed are those that can begin to understand and feel the love ofthe Father before they become fathers.

I wish I had put down the "shields" to His Grace a lot earlier in my life. I thank Him for penetrating those shields and for his only Son for showing us the way.

Blessings

Tim

Wondering

As I continue my faith journey and am learning more about my relationship with the kids and with the Father, I wonder if my daughters will be asking the same questions and having the same insights.

Blessings

Tim

Sharing Peace and Joy

Every encounter with the Father through prayer and the Sacraments fills us with joy and peace. Why shouldn't our children's time with us be any different? The peace and joy of His Grace is always there for us to ask for and take part in. Why shouldn't it be like this for us and our children

Granted, there is a time for discipline and keeping them on the straight and narrow. But when they come home from school, is it just business as usual? Or do you greet them like the father when the Prodigal Son returns home?

Our lives are so complicated, so busy, so hectic, so stressful. It's a tough thing to create this "bubble" of the Kingdom of Heaven around our children. It's worth it though, isn't it?

Blessings

Tim

Great Testimony

A great testimony from Kristin on "why she wastes her time worshiping". Good stuff. Hint: She really doesn't think it is a waste of time.

Blessings

Tim

Emily is a light of the world

Our oldest, Emily, is a kind, warm, loving child. She is also very outgoing, which is totally different from her mother and I. In many ways this is a blessing because she is able to make friends with a variety of children that are different from her. Whether they are children of different races, different gender, or just have different interests. She seems to be this light that other children are drawn to.

Something that I struggle with is how do we nurture this so that she can use this for good and not for bad? Jen and I have told her on occasion that since she makes friends so easily, that she needs to make sure that other kids are included and not left out. I just hope that she doesn't learn to use her charisma as a tool to hurt or exclude others.

Hopefully we are helping along the right path. We have such a good foundation in that she has the right temperament and the charisma to be the light of the world. My wife and I should therefore always keep in mind the following (emphasis mine) as we raise her:

"You are the light of the world. A city set on a mountain cannot be hidden. Nor do they light a lamp and then put it under a bushel basket; it is set on a lampstand, where it gives light to all in the house. Just so, your light must shine before others, that they may see your good deeds and glorify your heavenly Father."

Matthew 5: 14-16

Any thoughts or useful suggestions are gladly accepted.

Blessings

Tim

Facebook and Reconnecting with the Pleasures of His Creation, Part 2

In my previous post I talked about reconnecting with the pleasures of His Creation. Namely, enjoying everything around me because all things were created by Him through his Son.

At this point you are probably asking yourself, what does this have to do with your Blog - "fatherhood and the Father"? The Father has created this world for us to enjoy so that we can love and serve him. It is a gift to us that we must take care of.

And this gets me to the point. Together with my wife, we have created a small microcosm of the world in our house and their little "bubble" of life which consists of mommy, daddy, the pets, and the house. This little microcosm is their little world created by my wife and I. Just as the Father has created this world for us to enjoy and show us his love, it is our duty to ensure that our children's world is as secure and enjoyable as our love for them is deep.

A difference in my mind, and I know there are many but this is the one that is relevant for me at this point, is that we do not create this world for our children in order that they serve us. Quite the contrary, we create the world around them so that they learn to be loved, to love, and to love the Father and his only Son.

Blessings to you

Tim

Enjoying His Creation

We took a ride to see the Snow Geese up near Mt. Vernon and the Bald Eagles who are wintering along the Skagit River. Short trips like this are how we try to spend our Sundays together as a family. Sometimes, life intercedes and we aren't able to something like this. But we do the best we can, right? Here are some pictures from the trip.

This one is looking across the fields of the Skagit Valley towards Mt. Baker.

Another shot of Mt. Baker, this time framed by some trees on the edge of the farms fields.

Close up of some of the snow geese and even some trumpeter swans

Finally, a shot of the final rays of sun on the Cascades near Rockport, WA. I beg to differ from those who say there isn't a God. Our Father has a wonderful, beautiful pallete.

Blessings to you all

Tim

Inaugural Post!

Welcome to fatherhood and the Father!

I've been thinking about starting a blog concerning my faith journey and my journey in fatherhood. At times I can't help being amazed at the similarities between being a father and how that parallels our relationship with God the Father.

The idea of using a blog to help articulate my thoughts and insights has been rolling around in my thick head for a year or so. I even had the title in mind from the very beginning, so thank goodness it wasn't snatched up by someone else.

As you can probably see by the "thick head" comment, I'm probably my worst critic, so at times it may sound like I'm being too hard on myself.  However, things are always darkest before the dawn.  I think that only by being critical of myself, I will be able to see where I need improvement, and through the Grace of the Father, I will become a better father.

In order to understand where I am going, it is probably important for you to understand where I am coming from. To that end, what follows is a slightly edited version of a talk I gave at our parish in 2005. 

"I was baptized an Episcopalian and fell away from the denomination starting in high school and while studying to be an engineer in college. Part of the problem was the way secular society warps your sense of religion. Another problem was that although I went through all the catechesis for becoming confirmed, the stories from the Old and New Testaments did not seem relevant to this time in history or to me.

I married a cradle Catholic. Little by little it seemed I was pulling her away from the Church because I was so anti-Catholic and not very willing to go with her to Mass. In fact, I hated it.

But things started to change when we moved to the Pacific Northwest almost 5 years ago. I started toying with the idea of becoming Catholic to make my wife and her family happy. But because it didn’t feel right, I resisted that impulse. Jennifer and her family never did ask me to convert, nor did they apply any pressure. I have a feeling there was some intercession on her Mom’s part in the form of prayer.

I can liken the progress of my conversion to the turns of a key unlocking the door to my heart. Like most locks that haven’t been turned in a while, the process usually takes time and a few attempts. The first came with the extreme happiness and joy with the birth of our daughter, Emily, in March of 2003.

Then, another turn of the key came on a silent night a month or two later. While I was rocking Emily to sleep, I looked out the skylight in her nursery into the night sky and saw the moon and stars. It was then that I knew that there was a God. Only God could make the beauty I was seeing and allow me to feel the love I was feeling for this helpless little person swaddled in my arms.

A few weeks later, Jennifer’s Mom gave me some tapes from a Catholic Apologist named Tim Staples. It was from this that I learned how wrong I was in bashing the Church.

That summer, shortly after he came to the Parish, Father Rob gave us his now famous homily on the Loaves and Fishes. This Homily opened my eyes to the beauty and truth that is layered in the Gospel and is always there if we just open our eyes and dig a little.

What finally sealed the deal for me was seeing a preview of “the Passion of the Christ” in July 2003. Some loved it, some didn’t. Say what you will, but it affected me profoundly. But prior to seeing it, when I learned about our Lord's Passion in Sunday School or read about it in Scripture, it was very antiseptic. If you could imagine, it was what I would call very one dimensional. The preview of the movie, like a good homily or bible commentary quite literally brought the Passion of our Lord to life for me. It was through the brief images of our Lord suffering that I began to realize the depth of the love our God has for us. Our Father's Love suddenly became real for me.  When I realized how much love that Jesus had for us and how far I had strayed, I cried harder than any other point in my life and felt an extreme desire to become Catholic.

It was at this point that I called Sister Susanne and signed up for RCIA. During our discussion, Sister said something that I will always remember. She said that studies have shown that the spirituality of a child is fostered by the example of their father. “All the more reason for me to convert,” I thought at the time.

Since then I have gone through RCIA and was received into the Church in Easter 2004.

“Big deal, you converted” you might say. Well, let’s contrast where I was and where I am now:

• I am now pro-life, whereas before I was pro-choice. My pro-Life stance has been further reinforced by the writings and example of the life and death of John Paul the Great.
• I was previously very anti-Catholic and you can ask my wife that I frequently bashed the Catholic Church. I am now a Cathoholic.
• I regularly pray the Rosary v. bashing the church’s dogmas and traditions of Mary.

There are other numerous examples, but I think I have made my point.

My conversion has allowed me to see the world and this community through new eyes. I now can see or try to see the love and beauty of God in everything, and for that I am thankful. I take special notice of things and consider the fact that when I do see them, at that particular moment in time and from that particular point of view, God has managed to setup things up for me to feel the pleasure of his creation. Here are some examples:

• The bald eagle that perches on a tree along the shore of Lake Sammamish that I see every once in a while when on my way into Redmond.
• The view of Yosemite National Park from Glacier Point.
• The beauty and awe of the salmon returning home from the sea.
• I can see it in things as mundane as how great iced tea tastes with lemon.
• Because I am an engineer I appreciate the beauty inherent in math. Things like Pi and the Fibonacci numbers.
• The confirmation of forgiveness from the Rite of Penance.
• Most of all, I see the beauty and love of God in everything that my daughter does...even though she is in the terrible twos. But even then, there is beauty in the fact that she is learning to be an independent person.

Through her, I feel awe, luck, wonder, and I feel deep love. Through the love of our daughter I have come to begin to understand the kind of love that God the Father has for us. The love that is infinitely greater than our own capacity to love our own children. Even after dealing with an episode of the terrible twos, I even understand the love that the father has for the prodigal son.

For this revelation, I am thankful to God.

Some things have changed since then. I have lost some of my zeal for the faith. I no longer pray the rosary regularly, though I miss the peace it gives me. We have had another beautiful little girl. The push and pull of everyday life have tried to wear me down.

But it is my hope that among other things, this blogging exercise will help me continue on the journey and bring me close to the Father and his Son.

Pray for me.

Tim

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