John Janaro's Blog, page 265

He Still Comes to Dwell With Us

Christmas is an invitation to faith, trust, and love.
In our world that is so violent and selfish, that seems so hopeless in so many ways, God still comes to dwell with us.
Christmas calls us to reaffirm our faith in the mystery of the Incarnation, in God’s definitive intervention into the story of the human race; God making Himself present in the midst of human cruelty, barbarism, blindness, idolatry, and willful ignorance of His compassion and love.

Sometimes Christmas can seem a little abstract, as the world seems to go on in the same way as ever, with all of its conflicts and pride and grasping for power.
We also don't seem to change much. Our lives are still a mess. We've spent another year going around in circles, seeking our own satisfaction, accumulating new grievances, complaining, gossiping, screwing up the relationships that matter most to us, hurting the people we love.
And now it's Christmas and we stress out over gifts and food, and then we go to church and kneel before the infant Jesus and maybe it strikes us:

"Gosh, I have to admit that God is just not very important in my life. For me, being a religious person means regarding God as the Cosmic Policeman. I try not to disobey the rules. I respect Him. But I live my own life, and, frankly, I'm more comfortable when He's not around. I pray: 'Dear God, I'll be good. Okay? Protect me. Give me the stuff I need. And give me some goodies too, some nice stuff. And then leave me alone. Let me have some fun. Please?' "

But who are we talking to? A baby.
Doesn't that surprise us? We pray to God and gaze upon the image of a baby. Not because we thought it would be a good idea to represent God as a baby, but because God really became a baby.
We didn't make this up. It happened. God came into the world. He made Himself "small" so that He could enter into our lives. 
What does this mean for us? We can only grasp this by faith. We can only live the reality of this by trust and love. Let us ask the Lord to stir up this faith, trust, and love in our hearts.
If we let God into our hearts -- the God who has become so small for our sake -- we will begin to discover what this is all about. God has come to us. God has given everything. He has poured Himself out in Love. He can do this because He is Love.
And He has come to be the One who accompanies us in our misery and leads us out and beyond all of it. The fullness of the revelation of God’s love is mercy.

This baby is God's mercy. The God who is Love wants to be close to us, to save us. His name is Jesus.

Jesus is the gift of God’s merciful Love to the world, to restore -- indeed to transform -- human beings into His image and likeness. He is the reason for the joy that calls out to our hearts at Christmas.
He wants to take care of the messes of our lives, to come to us not as a threat to our humanity, but precisely as the One who generates that humanity, who creates love, who creates freedom, who makes me to be me.
The "real me" is created and redeemed in the image and likeness of God. The "real me" is not found in distraction and evasion born of fear, or the graspings of pride. The "real me" is made for freedom, for love, for self-giving in a relationship with the God who is Freedom, Love, Gift, who gives Himself to me -- and with all my brothers and sisters among whom I find Him again, the One who comes to be with me, the One who gives, Jesus, my baby brother.
Let us believe in Him, trust Him, love Him, knowing that all has been accomplished, that in the risen and glorified Jesus and Mary the New Creation has already begun in its fullness.
Meanwhile, let us live our faith in this present age so that we might grow into the fullness of trust and perfect adherence to His mercy, and so that we might witness the gift of God’s love in a world of sin, a world of confusion and violence, a world that is afraid of God, that wants to forget God.
The world strives to live without God, and then groans with the awful anxiety of the darkness, the dread of being alone, the failures and the guilt that cannot be fixed, and the dying without knowing why.

Yet "God so loved the world that He gave His only Son..." and God still loves the world through this irrevocable gift.
The gift is Jesus.
He has come to dwell with us, and He offers Himself to everyone who will receive Him with faith, trust, and love.

A Tremor of Bliss

Martyrdom of Thomas Becket, December 29, 1170. Detail, window in Canterbury Cathedral.
"They shall find the shepherd here; the flock shall be
          spared.
I have heard a tremor of bliss, a wink of heaven, a
          whisper.
And I would no longer be denied; all things
Proceed to a joyful consummation"

~Spoken by the character of St Thomas Becket from the play Murder in the Cathedral by T. S. Eliot).

A Janaro Christmas: Pictures and Reflections

Early Christmas morning. The Janaros went to midnight Mass, and the family picture (below) was taken at 2:00 AM!

We wish everyone a very Merry Christmas season! Here are a few pictures. You all understand, of course, that the adolescents in this house are rather particular about appearing in photographs. I've been sneaky a few times but I won't press my luck here. That means that the people you'll be seeing (for the most part) are the usual camera hams in the family.

The stockings were hung by the chimney with care. But the sofa blocked the way from the chimney to the living room. Sorry, Santa!

"No problemo" for Santa. (n.b. even Josefina knows that St. Nicholas doesn't come down the chimney, but we have fun pretending!)

In fact, it turns out that "Santa Claus" is a Washington Nationals fan!

Children and young folks and old folks too made short work of the present opening, once we finally got up!

Teresa got this... umm... twenty-first century skateboard thingy. Whatever it is, she loves it!

Here are a couple of monkeys!

Oh, John Paul is in this picture. But if he sees it, I expect he won't care that much.

And food-glorious-food we had in abundance. Pepper slices filled with goat cheese and tomatoes and scallions. Yum, yum!

The main dish was a pork roast that totally rocked! The gravy was made with apples and onions.

And it was this wonderful lady who made it all happen, again! I love you, Eileen Janaro!

 The true Gift of Christmas is the source of our hope and joy. Jesus holds us together and enables us to help one another.

In my Christmas dinner toast I said, "Jesus, thanks for coming!"

Truly, Jesus, You are everything to us. Thank You, above all, for the hope of eternal life, which enables us to see Your gift in everything, and which is teaching us to hunger and thirst for Your beauty in all the joys and sorrows of this life, confident in the hope that You work all things for the good.

Pictures on a blog might lead one to believe that "everything is awesome," that a family is chipper all the time and has no problems. But anyone who reads this blog knows that our family and our friends are on a journey, full of work and stumbling, full of failure and suffering, but also full of Someone who has come and who wants to be with us always.

There is joy, unconquerable joy, that consists in Him, in His presence which draws us to stay with Him, to adhere to Him, to believe in Him, trust in Him, love Him.

God is with us. God has come to be with us because He loves us. And to reveal that He IS Love. At the center of life, sustaining everything in being, is the One who is Love. The promise that stirs within our hearts is true: Gift, Goodness, Beauty, Truth, Love are the meaning of everything.

And this meaning has come because He wants to be with us. The meaning of everything has a name: Jesus.

Never give up.

And Merry Christmas!

Christmas 2014

Christ is born.
Come, let us adore Him!
William Congdon, "Nativity" (1960)

Why is Christmas So HARD?

Dear Santa Claus: It would be a lot easier if you REALLY DID do this job!It's Christmas Eve.

Many of us are stressed out. There are all these things to do, and we are all running around to fix every detail "just right" and to meet every expectation. We are determined that we are going to make our Christmas MERRY!

We may be troubled, broken, confused people; we may have dysfunctional families, or families separated by distance or rife with division, but we are going to do what we think we're "supposed to do" in order to construct a kind of ritual happiness. We will have gift-giving, and a big meal, and we will try to hold our tongues and not fight with one another.

Or when relationships have been severed beyond our hope, or when loved ones have died and are painfully missed, we will struggle to build new Christmas happiness rituals, holding back the tears as best we can.

We stress out and work so hard to make Christmas happy, or at least to make it look happy.

This is understandable. We want so much to be happy. And this time of year can feel like a weight, an obligation to be happy even if we don't know how, or don't think we can be happy. Still, we try so hard!

We try to make Christmas joy happen. Or, at least, we try to make something happen that feels like joy.

Why is it so hard?

We must take time to remember that the real happiness, the real joy of Christmas, does not have its source in anything we make.

The joy of Christmas is a gift. It is a gift freely given to us. A wonder. An utterly surprising, amazing, unimaginable gift that has been given to each and every one of us without exception.

Of course we work hard, make sacrifices, and try to set aside our disputes for the sake of a celebration. It's human to seek happiness, to hope for it, and to celebrate it.

But let us remember that our celebration is not a desperate, exhausting, confusing effort to build a great tower that will somehow reach and grasp that mysterious happiness that always eludes us.

This effort always leads to disappointment. Even if we have vacations and smiling pictures and fun and great memories, we will still -- in the end -- find ourselves empty when the lights come down and the long nights of January stretch out before us.

Disappointment. For some it triggers or exacerbates illnesses of mind and body. Others find ways to forget it, suppress it, or return to the (always temporary) truce that human beings make with boredom and mediocrity in their daily lives.

Christmas is not meant to lead us to disappointment. We must remember, again and again, that we are not trying to build a tower reaching up to an unattainable happiness.

We are preparing a place to welcome a gift that has already been given to us, to celebrate this gift, to rejoice in it. The gift belongs to each one of us, and nothing can take it away from us.

We can ignore it. We can run away from it. But the gift remains. It waits for us. It promises joy if we will only receive it. And the gift is so great that it will heal and open our hearts and enable us to receive it.

Whatever we may be suffering, the gift of Christmas is a triumphant Joy that opens for us a path and gives us the steps that lead from joy to joy, so that we can walk the road of joy and learn how to give ourselves in turn to this gift of Joy that never ends.

Let us remember: The Joy of Christmas is a Gift.

Let us welcome this Gift in a celebration of wonder and gratitude.

My Oldest Daughter Turns Sixteen

December 21 was Agnese Janaro's 16th birthday. She is a beautiful and very talented young lady, with a big, big heart. I'm so grateful for her and I love her so much.

Many saw these pictures on social media posts, but I'll post them here for the sake of her grandparents if nothing else.

I made a virtual photo frame with pictures of Agnese as a baby, a toddler, and current:


And she made this amazing cake. She conceived it, designed it, baked it from scratch, and put it all together. The figures are from a Lord of the Rings collection. Behind Bilbo Baggins's round green door is dark chocolate cake which was moist and delicious.

THE CAKE:


Amazing cake, amazing kid. She's a beautiful child with a great soul. Happy Birthday Agnese!

"Josefina-in-a-Box" - THE MOVIE!

Yesterday we got Christmas package that came in a pretty small box. We unpacked the box and looked at the stuff. Soon after that, Josefina found her way into the box; some readers may have seen this picture yesterday on social media:

I thought it was really funny. But I didn't expect her to be quite so creative in playing with the box. She turned it into her "bedroom" and made herself comfortable. I could never be comfortable in a position like this, but little kids are flexible.
She fixed up the environment quite nicely, and pretended to be asleep:

Then she started trying to hide, read books, or just act goofy:

Taking advantage of the hammy atmosphere, I attempted to make a video. I turned out to be the bigger ham, but the video is still cute.
With that assurance, I bring you Josefina-in-a-Box: THE MOVIE! This is a "short" -- only about a minute, but it features a special guest appearance by James the Purple Unicorn. Lots of fun! 

The Eloquence of Weakness

No doubt you heard and/or read today's gospel and thought, "I wonder if anyone has some good reflections on this. What does Zechariah's predicament have to do with ordinary human experience?"

Good questions. Your Magnificat Advent Companion 2014 addresses those very questions! (Subscribe to Magnificat. Help feed the Janaro family. Click HERE!) Below we present the Great Thoughts of one "Professor Janaro" ("Emeritus" -- which used to sound cool and important until Benedict made it a household word).

Actually, Janaro writes simply here, for he too has been slow to believe the promise. Will the angel of the Lord one day restore the energy and vigor of his voice? Whatever may be, he struggles now to be open to the eloquence of weakness.

Stretch Out Your Mighty Hand

        O Adonai        and Ruler of the house of Israel,        who showed Yourself to Moses        in the burning bush,        who gave him the holy law        on Sinai mountain:        Come, stretch out Your mighty hand        to set us free.
                       ~Antiphon for December 18

Grateful For Green

It's showtime for pines and firs and cedar trees and all the vines and shrubs that stay green all year. We've been ignoring you from the time of the first blossoms of spring all the way through the glowing colors of fall.

Now you're the only ones who haven't abandoned us. You remind us that there is life all through the soil even while so many other growing things sleep.


Thank you, evergreens, for your quiet company.