My mother liked to recall walking to Midnight Mass under the moon on the cold, clear December night when, for the first time in history, people were “up” there.  That Christmas Eve, three humans circled the moon 10 times, broadcasting back home a reading from the book of Genesis.  As my mother noted, the moon would never be the same again, nor would the earth, now that humans—accustomed to looking out from our planet at other heavenly bodies—arrestingly beheld a view of the earth from somewhere else.  As the astronaut who snapped the “Earthrise” photograph on that mission noted, they’d trained and prepared to explore the moon, but instead discovered Earth.

James and his friend Al went out for coffee. James found himself telling Al that he couldn’t get back to where he’d been before his wife died three years earlier. Work helped him keep going, as did his kids, friends and parish. He was praying, exercising and volunteering — but he felt worse instead of better, lost and uncertain. Nothing seemed to fit anymore. 

To listen to a young child babbling as children love to do, wanting to be heard, needing and learning to speak, is to hear the oft-repeated words: mama, dada (or baba).

And we recall: “Unless you change and become like a little child, you will never enter the kingdom of Heaven” (Matthew 18:3).

What is spirituality? It’s a word used so variously that defining it can seem like pinning a cloud to the wall. In Christianity, spirituality has a clear meaning. It refers to living a relationship.  

Spirituality is living life in relationship with the third Person of the Trinity, the Person of the Holy Spirit. It’s the life of the triune God, in the Holy Spirit.

Moving day, for most of us, might not be our favourite. Usually full of chaos and hard work, stress and mess, it’s something we put up with rather than look forward to.

My mother was an eager learner, but with little patience for pretence. She’d recount her dismay at asking a school teacher about the dogma of the Trinity, only to be shut down by being told: “It’s a mystery,” as if to say: "You can’t ask or learn about this; you must accept it without question." This she could not do, because she loved God. Her mind never gave up but always went further, equally willing to learn from her little children’s questions and from the lectures of her Basilian professors. (She appreciated having studied with professors of the calibre of Fr. Henry Carr). She delighted in learning, listening and talking about the mystery of the Trinity.

As with the disciples who walked the earth with Jesus, belonging to Him means belonging to each other — and this raises unavoidable questions, from who gets to be in charge, to what to do when somebody starts stealing. Even with Christ at the centre, it’s not easy to be a community.  

At a Project Rachel retreat, one participant approached a facilitator toward the end of the weekend. “Why?” she asked, incredulous. “Why would someone who’s never had an abortion want to spend their time helping us who have?”

As we can readily observe, it’s not Good Friday that needs to be proclaimed to the world but Easter Sunday. We all know about suffering, death and violence; no evidence is required. But the good news needs to be made known: that forgiveness has trumped cruelty, love has triumphed over death and the apparent victory of evil has become a tool in God’s hand to give us life eternal. Evil is revealed to be like smoke that vanishes in the breeze or wax that melts in the fire (Psalm 96).

A certain young woman had deep faith in God, but little connection with religion. Later she embraced Church life and revisited concepts, stories and Scripture passages she’d learned as a child and still understood in childish ways. She was astonished to discover one of the beatitudes declares: “Blessed are the meek” (Matthew 5:5).