Before I Forget…

· "You must come away to some lonely place all by yourselves and rest a while."
-Jesus (Mark 6:31)
· Rest and success are fellows.
-French Proverb
· If you want to kill Christianity, you must abolish Sunday.
-Voltaire
· We know that all things work together for good for those who love God, who are called according to his purpose.
-Romans 8:28

In the good old summertime! 
     Summertime is a season of great expectations.  Think of all the things you expect to do before Labor Day and get back to the routine.  I can't believe how "white" my legs are.  It would be good to get some color and exposure to the sun, but that gets trickier each year as the ozone layer hole expands.  A few years ago someone stole my bike out of the rectory garage.  I've been meaning to replace it and start cycling again.  Maybe I'll buy a new bike this summer.  I did buy a pair of roller blades and a week later I had knee surgery.  I expect to do a lot of roller blading.  But the vet told me that both my dogs are overweight, so I have to make time to exercise them.  Every year I tell myself that I'd like to vacation in Nova Scotia during the summer.  I just can't find the time.  Maybe next summer.  I've told family and friends that I'll have more time during the summer to get together - but I've been telling them that for years.  I can't remember the last time I went to a Saints game.  Maybe next summer.  I told Father Moudry that I'd really like to go to Seattle with him this summer and watch the Twins play the Mariners.  Who am I kidding?  But I expect to do it!  Friends keep    offering me the use of their cabins.  Yes, this summer I'll get to use them and take the novels I've been meaning to read.  Father Banker has a place on Gunflint Trail and has been asking me for years to come up.  Oh, yes, this summer.  Which reminds me: I haven't been to the BWCA since the late 70s; I'll have to get there this summer.  There are a lot of good workshops that I could attend and I'd be a bit smarter, but there's just no time this year.  Next summer.  I have a few new gardens that I'm planting at home.  I have to do some house painting that can only be done in warm weather.  I expect that summertime will give me more free time, relaxation and those lazy days that I remember while growing up in Hastings.
     Great expectations!  It's already the end of June and time is ticking away.  I have to spend a week in Rochester this month with the Archbishop and all the priests of the archdiocese.  We do this every two years.  All our meetings are in the basement meeting rooms of the Kahler Hotel.  A week without sun!  It's a week I fall behind in parish work and all my little chores.  I get home from work to do my gardening and those $#%! mosquitoes come out at dusk and drive me into the house.  Road construction seems to be everywhere and I'm spending extra time in the car going nowhere.  I should've never leased another SUV; it costs a small fortune to fill it up with gas.  Next time, I'm getting a Geo.
     Maybe I expect too much from summer, more than it delivers.  Maybe the issue lies with my expectations of summer, and my expectations of life itself.  Maybe I expect too much or the wrong things.  Summer are rather simple.  You should see my list of expectations about justice and peace, a better world, an alive church, and all the problems we face in this new century.  If I think that the world is changing too fast, how can I control that?  The problem is not with the world, nor my life, but how I choose to see it and live my own life.
     Do I believe that the world and my own life does finally rest in the "palm of God's hand," that there is in the heart of the universe a mystery called LOVE ?  Do we hope in what we trust but don't see, a mystery we see only darkly now, but will one day, see face to face?  When we reconnect with that hope our expectations change, about summer, about whom we are and what we want to do with our lives.  It changes the way we see ourselves and the world around us.  This hope gives us new eyes to see.  Other people become companions on the journey. Life does have meaning and God will make all things work for the good… that is our hope.
     When we reconnect with that hope we're able to relish the moment, to enjoy the encounter of friendship that expects nothing in return, of love that is undeserved and freely given, of old complaints we can let go.  Each new day is a gift.  To become hopeful people in this way changes the way we see the world and changes the way we journey through this life.
Let's just journey well and enjoy whatever that might bring!
 
Fr. Bill

P.S. Would it be too much to expect the Chicago Cubs to win the World Series this October?