Humor and Mercy

In my family there has always been a great use of humor.  We make puns and jokes and enjoy numerous pranks.

One of our family jokes has to do with the aftermath of meals.  With five young children, a table that is too small, and a severely handicapped child who needs to be fed, the debris field beneath the table after meals is a job for a SWAT team in full riot gear or the National Guard.  When they are done we call in the local fire department to hose everything down.  Failing that, we just drive a Zamboni through the dining room.  "Hey, Joe!  Your turn to zamboni the dining room."

"I've heard of the multiplication of the loaves, but this is ridiculous."

We also like to joke (always with great interior reverence for The Word of God) about about the passage in The Gospel according to St. Matthew, chapter 15:

[21] Then Jesus went thence, and departed into the coasts of Tyre and Sidon.
[22] And, behold, a woman of Canaan came out of the same coasts, and cried unto him, saying, Have mercy on me, O Lord, thou Son of David; my daughter is grievously vexed with a devil.
[23] But he answered her not a word. And his disciples came and besought him, saying, Send her away; for she crieth after us.
[24] But he answered and said, I am not sent but unto the lost sheep of the house of Israel.
[25] Then came she and worshipped him, saying, Lord, help me.
[26] But he answered and said, It is not meet to take the children's bread, and to cast it to dogs.
[27] And she said, Truth, Lord: yet the dogs eat of the crumbs which fall from their masters' table.
[28] Then Jesus answered and said unto her, O woman, great is thy faith: be it unto thee even as thou wilt. And her daughter was made whole from that very hour.



If said dog lived beneath our table, he'd look like this:.



Well, today I was hard at it in between meals, muttering to myself trying to maintain my waning patience, and I kind of said to myself, "Well that should be clean enough for the next round of chaos."  Then I had a thought shoot thrugh my mind : "What if Jesus thought like that at Mass or after our Confession?  What if He took the cynical attitude that He had just cleaned up after us and the next week would bring a whole new load of sins that He would have to clean up again?"  Suddenly that fat dog wasn't quite as funny any more.

I am always after my family telling them that we at least have to TRY to not make such a disaster.  Yes, the thought is worth some pondering because our good effort is not only necessary in spite of the infinite Mercy of God, but precisely BECAUSE of it.  Otherwise we risk the sin of presumption.

I remember having commited a serious sin one day and was looking for some consolation.  Having prayed mentally to St. Padre Pio,  I opened a wonderful biography about him (by Bernard Ruffin) and asked, "Padre Pio, do you have some word for me?"  I looked down at the page and read "That was a useless effort". If we want to hear the words "Well done, good and faithful servant", we will first have to fight the good fight --- and in some manner win.  Yes, Christ has already won the battle, but we must also carry the cross.

While helping with diaper changes and daily chores that young children bring, I have often pondered how this fits in to God's plan of salvation for us.  Little children too will ask innocently about why we have to use the toilet daily and about what happens to our food when we eat it.  A bit of simple thought about the whole cycle --from the seeds in the garden soil to the vegetables on the table and back to the waste pit-- can either produce a cynical hopelessness, or great joy at the wonder of God's great love for us.

This is a wonderful moment to remember Jesus's first miracle, the changing of water into wine --water representing death then becoming joyful life, a prefigurement of the Ressurection-- and His last miracle, the changing of bread and wine into His body and blood.  I explain to my children the immense beauty in the words Jesus says, in John 6; 53 -58, that "unless you eat my body and drink my blood, you have no life within you".  I get goose bumps when I think of the great love of Jesus when he says in Luke 22:15  "I have earnestly desired to eat this Passover meal with you before I suffer"

Just as the disciples cleaned up 12 baskets full of food after the multiplication of the loaves, we also must not waste the graces of God.  God is not like some haughty, proud billionaire who might say:  "I just gave you a million bucks.  Don't bother with the loose change." 

That fat dog under the table represents two things:  It represents God's infinite mercy, and it represents our  manifold sins and wickedness.  Jesus fed the five thousand with five loaves and two fish.  He does not need much from us, but he does need a few crumbs of effort.  Perhaps even a mustard seed would do.

Behold: Mary the Mother of God

In the fifth mysteries of the Holy Rosary we have The Finding of the Child Jesus in the Temple;  the Crucifixion and Death of Our Lord, Jesus; and the Coronation of Mary, Queen of Heaven and Earth.

These mysteries are beautiful in their close correspondence to God pointing to His Mother and His Mother reflecting back and magnifying the Lord.

In the Finding of the Child Jesus in the Temple, we find Jesus addressing His parents thus:  Luke 2: "49 And he said unto them How is it that ye sought me?  wist ye not that I must be about my Father's business? 50 And they understood not the saying which he spake unto them.  51 And he went down with them, and came to Nazareth, and was subject to them: but his mother kept all these saying in her heart."




So at the face of it, we have a 12 year old boy who is at once demonstrating astonishing understanding and wisdom in his dealing with the doctors in the temple, and then seeming to brush off the anguish of his desperate parents who love Him.  Then He obediently goes with them to Nazareth. 

Jesus is telling us that it is His mother and father who should know best that he is the Son of God because they are His teachers.  He is pointing to His mother from whom He took His flesh and through whose Immaculate Heart we receive the Bread of Life, the Holy Eucharist.  It is almost as if He asks her "Do you not remember who you are?"  Look at the great love here!  Would we not expect the opposite?  The modern mother might say "Who do you think you are doing this to your parents!?  I'm your mother!  Now get home with us now!"   Jesus, who later commands us to demonstrate our love for Him by keeping His commandments, demonstrates further his love of His mother and foster father by his quiet obedience to them.  His mother does not scold but magnifies His greatness pondering all these things in her heart.

In the mystery of the Crucifixion, Jesus again speaks to His mother:  John 19: "26 When Jesus therefore saw his mother, and the disciple standing by, whom he loved, he saith unto his mother, Woman, behold thy son!
27 The saith he to the disciple, Behold thy mother!  And from that hour that disciple took her unto his own home."


Perhaps once again it seems that Jesus is distant from his mother in addressing her as "Woman" rather than "Mother" or "Mama".  Yet at the same time he demonstrates His great desire to give his mother consolation and love by entrusting her to the care of the "disciple whom he loved" but not before first ensuring her continued motherhood.  Here is the great emcompassing of the Ark of the Covenant.  She holds all of us as her children by Jesus's command and we are heirs to everlasting life in the unfathomable brotherhood of the Word Made Flesh.  This flesh again is born of the pain and sorrow of the mother anguishing for her son.

In the mystery of the Coronation of Mary, Queen of Heaven and Earth, we read:  REVELATION 11 & 12
"19 And the temple of God was opened in heaven, and there was seen in his temple the ark of his testament: and there were lightnings, and voices, and thunderings, and an earthquake, and great hail. 1 And there appeared a great wonder in heaven; a woman clothed with the sun, and the moon under her feet, and upon her head a crown of twelve stars: 2 And she being with child cried, travailing in birth, and pained to be delivered."


Here we see again the Blessed Mother, the Ark of the Covenant, refered to as "woman" and the mystery beneath the cross and in the temple is revealed.  This title is one of deep respect and reverence for that which the Father holds so dear.  His Ark which encompasses His people whom he loves is at once triumphantly victorious as a the crowned Queen of Heaven -through her unparalleled humility and purity of heart-, and still suffering in anguish over her militant earthly family.

As we read through the 12th chapter of Revelation about the dragon's hate for the woman, the Ark, we see clearly her motherhood to the followers of her Son : "17 And the dragon was wroth with the woman, and went to make war with the remnant of her seed, which keep the commandments of God, and have the testimony of Jesus Christ."

In these three mysteries of the Holy Rosary, we see clearly Jesus pointing to His Mother with love and respect, His great gift of her to us and thus His gift of Himself to us, and her magnification of the Saviour in humility, the Incarnate Saviour, her very flesh and now our brother!

 LUKE 1: "46 And Mary said, My soul doth magnify the Lord,  47 And my spirit hath rejoiced in God my Saviour.  48 For he hath regarded the low estate of his handmaiden: for, behold, from henceforth all generations shall call me blessed.  49 For he that is mighty hath done to me great things, and holy is his name."