John Janaro's Blog, page 122

A Shining Star Passed Through Our Skies

DO I HAVE ANY REGRETS IN MY LIFE? 

Well, sure. One of them is that I did NOT go to a particular concert in Washington D.C. on June 8, 2016.

Christina Grimmie performed at the Rock n Roll Hotel on H Street (which just shut down for good a few months ago). Really, it was not that far away from us, nor too hard to get to. I'm so sorry I missed it. 

All the video clips I have seen from this final tour indicate that Christina was taking her voice to a whole new level. She was ON FIRE!

Blue Iris

This Iris flower is a vivid blue.

A Defiant Hong Kong Remembers Tiananmen Square

The drama of Hong Kong's struggle for freedom has reached a new level of crisis.

The PartyState in Beijing has decided unilaterally to impose a new "Basic Security Law" on the people of Hong Kong. There may yet be more bureaucratic formalities, but ultimately this means that mainland "security forces" will be able to intervene directly in activities in Hong Kong that their Beijing CCP masters determine to be "seditious."

A Hong Kong protestor or opposition candidate or pro-democracy legislator or journalist or grandmother sitting on a park bench can now be arrested if their behavior proves inconvenient to the Communist Party. Hong Kong's distinctive system of internal governance has been effectively and openly breached.

How the PartyState will use this newly decreed power remains to be seen. It's likely that people will begin to be "disappeared."

Meanwhile, even though the PartyState pretends (at least) to have Coronavirus under control, the local Hong Kong authorities banned the annual Tiananmen Square memorial gathering. In mainland China, of course, it has always been illegal to commemorate (and dangerous even to mention) the Beijing pro-democracy student protests of 1989 and their murderous suppression by the Communist People's Liberation Army on the infamous night of June 4.

Hong Kong people, however, have gathered enormous crowds every year, as such demonstrations were legal under their distinctive government system. This domestic political autonomy was supposedly guaranteed for Hong Kong by the "one country, two systems" treaty that united them with China in 1997. 

But what would Hong Kong people do for June 4, 2020? What would they do in the face of a direct ban and the new "security law" that looms over them?

They came out by tens of thousands to this candlelight vigil at Victoria Park, as well as other places throughout the city. (Pictures credit: Apple Daily and Stand News.) Little was done to hinder them (for the moment). And like the "Umbrella Revolution" of 2014 and the one million and two million person protest marches in June of last year, Hong Kong people once again gave the whole world a lesson in "civil disobedience."

These images are compelling and unambiguous. These people came in great numbers and in peace to speak truth to power. With the big ugly gun of the world's largest dictatorship loaded and pointed at their head, they brought candles. They stood in solidarity with their unarmed brothers and sisters from 31 years ago, who were met by bullets and tanks.

They even stood with ample space between one another because they were practicing social distancing!

The PartyState may very well crush the freedom and even the lives of the Hong Kong people. But they will never win their hearts. They will never convince anyone with a conscience that officially-sanctioned-violence is actually "necessary public security." They will be crafty, they will be brutal, and it will probably look like they have won. They will inflict much suffering. But whatever they do, their conquest will never be legitimate. It will remain a crime.

And peaceful witness to the truth will ultimately prevail, because violence - no matter how powerful - is doomed to consume itself.

"We Cannot Turn a Blind Eye..."

The box below quotes the words of Pope Francis from today's General Audience. What he says expresses more than anything I could make up on my own. 

People need to look directly at this violation of human dignity with open eyes. Right now, everyone has been provoked by it. One of the great stinking wounds of the social body is exposed in full view, its festering poison visible for all to see. 

This is no time for the kind of extended analysis, probing of complex issues and tendencies, and hypothesizing that historians habitually carry out in their ongoing search for "the larger perspective." Such endeavors have their time and place, but not at this moment. 

For myself, in any case, I must continue to learn what I can and to listen to the long sorrowful story of the African-American people. Their lives do matter, and they have every reason to insist that others recognize their long-neglected rights. Black Americans are a people who, over the course of four centuries, have been ruthlessly dislocated, enslaved, abused, repressed, cheated, and fragmented — a people who nevertheless have endured with a common memory, and continue to forge their own identity through the hidden resilience and quiet heroism of so many among them, a people who have the potential for greatness, and who are vital to the future of this nation and the world. They have already given so much, yet their sorrowful story continues, and they still suffer enormously.

The Pope directed these words to us today:


Racial injustice is an old, deeply entrenched source of the violence that has scarred the history of the USA from the first slave ships that arrived on these shores 400 years ago to the systemic hostility and humiliation perpetuated even to the present day.

As May ends and June begins in this nightmare that is the year 2020, new traumatic events have emerged that none of us can ignore. With the first loosening of public restrictions in what remains an unresolved and unpredictable viral pandemic, we have seen the monstrous, appalling spectacle of a helpless black man crushed-to-death beneath the knee of a police officer.

We first must regard the particular human persons whose affliction is in front of us. We must pray for the repose of the soul of poor George Floyd, and pray and weep for his grieving family. We also need to insist on justice and full accountability here. (Surely the multitude of honorable, decent, and brave policemen and women throughout the country desire this as much as anyone else.)

Lord, grant eternal rest to George Floyd, and console his loved ones and family, especially his little 6 year old daughter Gianna. Grant that honest justice and accountability will prevail, that hearts will change, that systems, dangerous practices, and bad mentalities will change. Have mercy on us. (Have mercy on me, Lord, for I am a man far too complacent in my ways. Change my heart, O God!)

Sadly, in the past several days, there have been riots in the streets of some American cities. There are complicated factors and motivations that can drive people to acts of angry desperation, but they cannot avoid being sucked into a whirlwind that serves only the agents of chaos. Violence begets violence in the perpetuation of the cycle of violence that becomes ever more self-defeating and mutually destructive. "Nothing is gained by violence."

There are also many people who are engaged in peaceful demonstrations, seeking constructive reforms, and trying to "work for peace and justice." It is a daunting, seemingly overwhelming task. But it is the way forward, and everyone in this country needs to be committed to it, and never give up. 

************

From the various places in which we stand now, we must discover and take the steps to make a new beginning, together, as human beings.

What will enable us to recognize one another as brothers and sisters? We are all such strangers to one another, and we so easily tend to cover our own isolation and fear with contempt for the other.

Racism is founded on lies. Racism is a pretext we use to disown our brothers and sisters, to absolve ourselves from relationship with them as persons, to close our eyes and ears to their sufferings, to dehumanize them and abuse them, or to have no care when they are treated like disposable objects, like garbage.

I am a sinner, implicated like everyone else in this pride that looks down on other human persons and treats them like "things." I have no hope except to follow Jesus Christ, to be converted to Him again and again, day after day, to beg for His mercy, and to open my heart to His life-giving Spirit.

I need to pray for a new heart. We all have to pray. Without turning to God, what hope do we have? Only when God gives us new hearts will we be able to see one another as brothers and sisters. Then we can find better ways to live together, to give and to share the various riches of humanity that God has given us and inspired us to cultivate as individual persons and as particular communities.

This "new heart" is a concrete possibility for every person, because God has become one of us, has taken flesh to dwell with us, to be with us, to stay with us. God is present among us as a man, Jesus, who has destroyed the ultimate power of death and sin, who is with us in all our pain, who is our Lord and our brother. He calls to Himself people from every nation, race, culture, from all the earth, from every time and place, including the particular places where we live right now.

Jesus our Lord remains forever human. He was born of a woman, Mary, who remains forever His mother. Here we have a very special reason for hope: we have a mother, and her tenderness reaches out to gather together all the brothers and sisters of her Son with untiring solicitude.

Echoing Saint John Paul II, Pope Francis entrusts the USA to the Mother of Jesus who has made her maternal presence most evident to all of her children in this hemisphere in a place south of our national border, on the hill of Tepeyac. Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe.

Like John Paul II, Francis calls her the "Mother of America."

John Paul is 23 Years Old!

John Paul turned 23 years old today.

It's mind-boggling. I remember very well when I turned 23, in the year 1986. I probably looked not entirely unlike he does now!

One big difference is that I still had ten years of academic study and travel and life in Europe ahead of me before I finally married his mother. Whereas his wedding is in two months and 8 days.

I think that's just fine. He's got the right girl. And he's a lot more mature than I was at his age!

The Holy Spirit and the Scope of Friendship

The Lenten and Easter Seasons of 2020 have been unlike any that we have ever experienced.

For laypeople, the inability to participate by a fully bodily personal presence in the liturgical life of the Church has been peculiar, challenging, and often frustrating. We felt the lack of many of the customary elements of the seasons, and above all we felt "distanced" from the Eucharist at the very heart of the liturgical year.

There was much grace in this experience, nevertheless. We had to trust in Christ's love, in the confidence that the Mass was still being offered for us every day by our bishops and priests. And we were able to share intentionally in those Masses that were livestreamed, and experience — again by the intention of our hearts and the aid of communications media — the vitality of encountering Jesus in the Eucharist "by desire," by what is called "spiritual communion."

Even when we were quarantined in our own homes, we found ways to "be together," to pray together, help one another, encourage one another in difficulties, and grow together by means of audiovisual interactive media and social networks. Though this is not the same as being in the same room, it was overall something we were glad we could do. Now we have a little more freedom to interact "directly" (sometimes only from behind a mask) with our friends, and also to attend Mass and receive the sacrament of the Eucharist.

A more restricted situation may yet return, or some worse calamity may befall us. But we now know from experience something of the interior strength of the bond that keeps us together in the Church. We know it is deeper than the limitations and hindrances of any circumstance. We have been able to reaffirm that, indeed, God is good, all the time. Perhaps we have also learned something about the strength and value of friendship.

Today is Pentecost Sunday. We ask the Holy Spirit to come and draw us more deeply into the communion of life we share in Christ and with one another.

The Holy Spirit sustains friendships in Jesus Christ and the Church. He makes it real that we are brothers and sisters. He is the true, original, and enduring “social network” that brings us all together and gives us a concrete perception of our common hope and common mission. Friendship, like all human realities, is elevated and transfigured by the grace of the Spirit. If we live in faith, we will find many signs of God's hand at work.

This includes, of course, the blessing and gift of the awareness of the ultimate significance of those deep, cultivated human friendships build upon decades of interaction and mutual trust. I am long past the age where a person realizes that no one has many friends of this kind. The very human richness of such friendships entails also their particularity, which is defined by places and time, personality types, qualities, rapport, common experiences, and many other circumstances that allow a friendship to be sustained and to grow over a lifetime.

Nevertheless, it's true even on a purely natural level that people have a wider circle of cordial relationships where the bond of friendship is also expressed and lived in varying degress and approximations. Here you do find some people who have "many friends," and — for most of us — it's possible and worthwhile to "make new friends" within this sphere.

In God's plan, however, the human capacity for friendship is transformed and acquires a special stature.

While respecting and making use of all the natural distinctions in human relationships, the Risen Christ wants to generate in us by His Spirit a new kind of affection for the human person, a new capacity for empathy, a more powerful perseverance in active love, a space for hospitality within our hearts (and therefore also within our communities) that is so much larger than anything human nature could accomplish on its own.

Thus the Spirit builds up Christ's body, His Church, through friendships that bloom and thrive — sometimes in unexpected places, and with a variety of people — and prove remarkably tenacious even in the face of many human tensions, disagreements, and conflict.

The great strength of such friendships is Jesus Christ Himself, to whom we belong (together)?* with all our hearts, with whom we are brothers and sisters, children of the Father, co-heirs to the Kingdom.

Still, the reality is that we fight all the time, and we hurt one another. Some of this follows from our fraternal closeness: siblings fight all the time, but (in healthy situations) they work things out within the context of the stability of family life. Unfortunately, it is too often the case that our conflicts express something other than the squabbling of siblings. Too often, we fight against one another and do violence to one another because we have forgotten who we are.

We have forgotten our responsibility toward one another in Christ. We have forgotten the grace of the Holy Spirit, the love of God poured out into our hearts that is also a love for our brothers and sisters, a love that "bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things" (1 Cor 13:7).

We have forgotten the reality of God's concrete presence in our lives. That is why we hate one another. "The one who says, 'I love God' but hates his brother is a liar" (1 John 4:20).

Misunderstandings cause tension. Diverse tastes and disagreements cause tension. The need, at times, to help one another to remember uncomfortable truths causes tension. The many stupid things we do to one another because we are still sinners cause tension. Many circumstances and things cause tension. These real human tensions, fractures, and wounds may require time and some "distancing" in order to heal, so that there can be real reconciliation.

Christians are not called to pretend that there is nothing wrong, ever, in their relationships, or that everything is always "great" (this pretense is a form of pride, because it evades the real character of the Spirit's gift, of His ways of transforming our humanity, in favor of a self-generated, artificial and inevitably inhuman facade the covers over our ongoing need for God's grace and forgiveness).

Christians are not called simply to be nice to one another and always appear to get along. Rather, they are called to remember that they are brothers and sisters. In Christ they belong to one another.

Openness to the Holy Spirit, in fact, will bring healing grace and the joy of the Lord to our lives and our relationships. We will love one another more, and within that mutual love God creates the "space" that welcomes others into this communion of friendship.

Every human person belongs to Christ, and is on a path (sometimes a very long and winding and mysterious path) toward Christ in the Father's plan. Our own contributions to evangelization intersect with and can shape (as God wills) the paths of persons in search of the meaning of life. These persons are also our brothers and sisters, journeying with their many traditions and the wisdom found in them, and according to the working of the Holy Spirit secretly in their own hearts, drawing them toward the embrace of Christ.

We are called to bear confident and patient witness to the Gospel, to point to Jesus Christ as the fulfillment of all that is good and true in the histories and traditions of their peoples and in the promptings of their own consciences and the longing of their hearts. Here too, friendships are born.

Every human person is created in the image and likeness of God, called to the embrace of Jesus Christ and the freedom of redemption from sin in Him, and prompted by the Holy Spirit who longs to lead them to the fullness of truth. Every person is our brother or our sister.

There is no place for hatred in our way of regarding or approaching any human person. We are called even to love our enemies... in the hope that they might become our friends.

The gift of the Spirit deepens and widens our capacity for friendship, not in the sense that we can have everybody as a "bosom buddy" (as I said, if we have a few of these over the course of a lifetime, it is a blessing), but so that we can walk together and help one another as companions on the journey towards our destiny, as brothers and sisters going home to our Father.

It is Christ our brother, the Lord of all creation and history, who leads us on this journey. Friendship is only a foretaste of the communion of love we will share with the Triune God and one another for all eternity when we finally arrive at the journey's end.

Come, Holy Spirit! Sustain our hope that we might persevere until we reach the fullness of life for which we have been created.

In the glory of the Father's house, we will dwell forever with God, seeing Him as He is. What does this mean for human friendship? Very much, because we are all called to be friends, to be brothers and sisters, to be together forever!

It should not be surprising that our growing in God's grace in Christ in this present life makes for enduring and faithful and forgiving friendships. There is no greater foundation!

Veni Sancte Spiritus!

The Conversion of Saint Camillus

My column in this month's MAGNIFICAT magazine appears immediately preceding the prayers for May 30th (or as a link on the May 30th page, if you're using the app or reading online). I decided to share it here as well.

The "origin story" of Saint Camillus is timely, because his apostolate of mercy lived out through many years of caring for the sick is one of the foundations of nursing and health care work in its modern form. His persistent devotion to the human person in need was Christ-centered and eminently practical, and he can inspire frontline workers in the current pandemic and all those who care for the sick poor.

Note that Magnificat remains available online for FREE during this period of various health restrictions, in both its USA and U.K./Ireland editions. Check that out if you haven't already done so.

Saint Paul VI: Joy in the Midst of Tribulation

Today we celebrate Saint Paul VI, the Pope of my childhood, the Pope of the Second Vatican Council and the tremendous struggles that followed immediately upon it for the Church and the world.

May 29th is now the memorial of this profoundly holy man, who taught courageously, suffered greatly, and loved Jesus Christ and the Church with all his heart. Also, this is the 100th anniversary of his ordination.
Near the end of his papacy, on May 9, 1975, the frail and apparently beleaguered Pope — whose fidelity to the gospel and his own particular mission as Successor of Saint Peter were so often misunderstood, bitterly criticized, or dismissed by the various factions of the post-conciliar crisis — published the beautiful and wise reflection Gaudete in Domino, on joy in the Lord. The whole text is worth reading, having lost none of its insight, vigor, or relevance after 45 years.
Here I quote (in bold type) a few passages that resonate with these days as we prepare to celebrate Pentecost, as we find ourselves once again so very much aware of our need for renewal in the Holy Spirit:
"John XXIII...envisaged a kind of new Pentecost as a fruit of the Council. We too have wished to place ourself in the same perspective and in the same attitude of expectation. Not that Pentecost has ever ceased to be an actuality during the whole history of the Church, but so great are the needs and the perils of the present age, so vast the horizon of mankind drawn towards world coexistence and powerless to achieve it, that there is no salvation for it except in a new outpouring of the gift of God. Let Him then come, the Creating Spirit, to renew the face of the earth!" (Gaudete in Domino VII:2)

In the present world "the joy of the kingdom brought to realization [in the risen and glorified Jesus] can only spring from the simultaneous celebration of the death and resurrection of the Lord. This is the paradox of the Christian condition which sheds particular light on that of the human condition: neither trials nor sufferings have been eliminated from this world, but they take on a new meaning in the certainty of sharing in the redemption wrought by the Lord and of sharing in His glory.

"This is why the Christian, though subject to the difficulties of human life, is not reduced to groping for the way; nor does he see in death the end of his hopes. As in fact the prophet foretold: 'The people that walked in darkness has seen a great light; on those who live in a land of deep shadow a light has shone. You have made their gladness greater, you have made their joy increase....' (Isaiah 9:2) The Easter Exultet sings of a mystery accomplished beyond the hopes of the prophets: in the joyful announcement of the resurrection, even man's suffering finds itself transformed, while the fullness of joy springs from the victory of the Crucified, from His pierced heart and His glorified body. This victory enlightens the darker souls. 'Et nox illuminatio mea in deliciis meis' [from Easter Vigil liturgy].

"Paschal joy is not just that of a possible transfiguration: it is the joy of the new presence of the Risen Christ dispensing to His own the Holy Spirit, so that He may dwell with them." (Gaudete in Domino III:9-10)

Finally, there is this one passage from Gaudete in Domino V:6, which I highlighted in a box and shared on social media. These words struck me as profound and timely regarding some of the trials our family has been called to endure over the past couple of years, with the illness and death of my Dad ("Papa" to his grandchildren) and the ongoing disability of my Mom ("Grandma"). Something of this "paradox" is hidden deep down in the experience of grief, and it expresses the mysterious working of the grace of the Holy Spirit "within" many kinds of suffering:

"Blue Ridge Mountain Spring" and "Rose Study no. 11"

Here are a couple of pieces of digital art that I recently completed and circulated on other media platforms. The first one portrays the Shenandoah Valley and the Blue Ridge Mountains as they appear this time of year in various shades of blue and green:


Then I continue my "Rose Study" series with "Rose Study, no. 11," based on a photo of a clipping from those multi-seasonal blooming rose bushes down the road. They are blooming now.

An Ongoing Epidemic: Lyme Disease Awareness Month

The last thing people want to think about these days is another strange widely-spread disease.
The good news is that you cannot catch this disease from other people. The bad news is that the insects carrying this infection are probably in your front yard. We are talking, of course, about the peculiar tick that carries the bacteria and other microbial co-infections commonly referred to as Lyme Disease.
Oh yeah, you're used to being worried about that one.

The tragic and dramatic events regarding COVID-19 that we are living through right now have probably taken precedence on your worry list over these other things. You may have even forgotten that May is "Lyme Disease Awareness Month." I almost forgot about it myself (the "month," that is). We have all been preoccupied with the present struggle against a highly contagious ("human-to-human") virus. But for those little ticks (much smaller than the image in the creepy picture above), their blood-sucking life goes on as usual. And the bacteria and microbes they carry can cause big problems.
I have been on a crazy-nuts odyssey with Lyme Disease since 1988 (well, on and off, or somewhat on and somewhat off... more or less "manageable" right now). It has contributed to my "interesting" and wacky life, limited me in certain external ways, and has had low points which were just not fun at all.
Now, "in the time of Coronavirus," I have to remember that I don't have the world's best immune system. I'm used to staying-at-home and working from home and having a lot of virtual connections anyway. Strange illnesses are not new to me. But the whole world having to deal with a strange, capricious illness and its consequences? That is new to me.
Nevertheless, Lyme Disease is still around. I have written about it plenty of times in this blog. A good overall source of information is the Global Lyme Alliance. I do not mean to increase anyone's anxiety here, but it's just good to have information on hand. Another page that is useful for navigating to a variety of resources (if you don't mind the Sk8r Girl, Rock Chick design) is my "Lyme Sister" Avril Lavigne's Foundation which, along with other causes, helps people who are suffering from this disease which kept the famous Canadian singer-songwriter off her feet for two years.
COVID-19 is a very different thing from Lyme Disease, pathologically speaking.
Though, ironically, it may be true that many people get Lyme but never have any symptoms. But they cannot pass it on to others (unless they bite someone