A-Mends

 Amends can be broken into two phrases:  “A” and “mend.”  The A when connected to the mend means we tell someone we are sorry for what we did.  We apologize.  We may even confess a shortcoming that fueled the bad behavior.  But this does not focus on the “Mend” part of amends.  To mend means to fix.  Here you are trying to fix what is broken in you, that which leads to bad behavior and harm to self and others.  Apologizing is only half the action.  We have to work on the self on a daily disciplined and focused activity, such as prayer and meditation.  You are broken and need fixing/repair/overhaul.  You only have power to break.  Some other Power is needed for the fixing.  

The Not-God

 I am not God.  If someone decides to act badly or destructively to themselves, I try not to go into a guilt trip or blame myself, that I could have or should have done more.  I am but a mere human being offering  help, preaching, teaching, befriending.  I don’t know the effects that I might have in my aim to be helpful.  But I do know that I am better off for trying to be of some service.  The results are not in my control.  I am not God.  

To Do Or Not To Do

 If a person wants to drink themselves into oblivion day after day or on a binge, there is not much I can do for them directly.  I can pray for them.  Self-destructive behavior is rather oblivious to help.  But if someone wants to stop this behavior, then that is my business.  As a priest I run into people who are on self-imposed misery.  I am powerless here.  But then I seem to be found or find people who want to get out of this madness they are in.  That is my business, to be helpful to those who want help.  I believe you can help the helpless if they want help.  

Anger At What?

 Some people are very angry with a god who did not come through for them.  So they stopped believing in God, but they stayed angry.  As someone pointed out, now you are angry at something you don’t think exists.  If someone says they do not believe in a god because they have never much thought about it or were never taught anything, they are rarely angry.  They might be puzzled at believers, but they are not angry.  When I find anger and non-belief in the same person, their atheism is suspect.  You cannot be angry at what does not exist.  Maybe that is why Step Two in recovery programs is about asking to be restored to sanity, so you can at least be angry at what does exist or drop the anger.  

Pluto

Remember when Pluto was a planet, the ninth and farthest from the sun?  And then it was declared “no planet.”  As one astronomer said, this does not make it worse than it was before simply because its ID was changed.  “Planet” is not a status, but rather an identification of something.  Pluto is still Pluto.  Nothing changed in Pluto.  So why do we people get all upset when someone changes our identification.  We are still the same person.  So many of us cannot accept ourselves without some title, which we think gives us a better status.  We are still the same person.  Title does not change us.  Whether someone calls me “Father” or not, does not change who I am.  If someone calls you a “name” out of disrespect or hate, that does not change who you are.  Don’t see yourself through the eyes of others.   

Spiritual Principles

 If you are an addict to something and you go to recovery meetings faithfully, read the literature, work inventory steps, you will find your flaws, character defects, such as selfishness and fear.  But all you have gotten so far is knowledge.  And as one person said, “Knowledge avails us nothing,” when it comes to addiction.  You have to live by spiritual principles.  Have a Higher Power and pray to this power in words and then meditation.  I have heard of many a person who went to lots of meetings for a while, read the books, worked some steps, but never prayed or formed any relationship with a Higher Power and then they went out, their lives got worse and so on.  Spiritual principles will make us loving people.  

The Purpose

 Not everyone on a communion line will have the same response to the host they receive.  If they receive a couple times a year, holidays, family visits and such, I doubt that the host means much.  They see with the physical eye that the host is a round white wafer.  They taste with the physical tongue nothing much.  Sacraments, to be effective, must be approached from a heart level.  Someone why sees with the eye of the heart, and tastes with the heart of the tongue, will have a rather profound experience of that wafer.  Persons receiving at this level, depth, might then be able to see beneath the actions of others, hear deeper than the words spoken, and then speak with the tongue of the heart to the pain buried deep with that other person.  Jesus on the cross saw in his public executioners something deeper, some pain they buried, so that they could do what they do.  And he said, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they are doing.”