Fr. Frank Majka, SJ – The Bridge

Who’s Afraid of 2012?

As if there weren’t already enough to make us uneasy, now we have the 2012 phenomenon, which asserts that when the Mayan calendar ends its cycle in 2012, the world will end and a new age will begin. People who believe this have different ways of explaining how it will happen, but they all agree on when — in 2012. (Interestingly, if Wikipedia is to be believed, many of today’s Mayans don’t believe there is anything at all special about 2012.)

What are Christians to believe? The New Testament talks about the end of this age and the start of another, but does so from several angles. Matthew, for instance, preserves the saying of Jesus that the end of the world will come at a time known only to God, not to us (Matthew 24). John, on the other hand, suggests that the new age has already begun because of the life, death, rising, and glorification of Jesus (see John 20, with its clear reference to the Genesis story of God’s breathing his spirit into Adam).

Embodying both of these strains, Paul writes in his letters that the whole creation is eagerly awaiting the end, when it will be set free to share in the glory of God’s children (Romans 8). But he also says that for anyone who is in Christ, there is already a new creation and the old has passed away (2 Corinthians 5).

The bottom line for Christians is that there’s nothing to fear from 2012. We focus our attention not on a calendar but on Jesus. The liturgy for Holy Saturday night says it best, perhaps, as it directs our attention to the risen Christ, calling him “the beginning and the end, the Alpha and the Omega,” and declaring, “All times belong to him, and all the ages. To him are glory and power through every age forever.”

Three Types of Deciding

Ignatius Loyola highlighted three types or ways of making decisions.

Click below to hear what they are and how they work.

Ignatius_3_Ways_of_deciding

Sure You Need That Second Cup?

Sky Sights

I missed seeing the Perseids this year. That’s the name of the meteor shower which happens every August. Last week it was too cloudy, so I couldn’t see it; but there will be many clear nights for sky-watching before August comes around again.

The ancients watched the night sky because they believed things there revealed things about the earth below, predicting events like changes in rulers, dynasties, and the fortunes of nations. Now, we have experts, pollsters, and talk show personalities to do that. No one in our technological culture looks at the night sky anymore for signs of things to come.

I don’t look to the heavens for portents, nor do I listen to pollsters and talk show personalities, for that matter. But I still look up at the night sky because the Bible is correct when it says, “the heavens declare the glory of God and the firmament proclaims his handiwork.”

Besides, I can also see the most remarkable things there — like meteors and, if I look hard, I find a lady sitting in a chair, a swan, a mighty hunter, a scorpion, a ram, a ladle, and not one but two bears!

(photo source unknown)

Markers

In our culture, two birthdays have special meaning. Call them marker birthdays if you like. My first one was on July 5, 1966, when I become a legal adult. (People today, of course, become legal adults three years earlier, able to do all sorts of things except drink legally). The second happened this year, when I turned 65 and officially became a “senior citizen,” eligible for medicare and a whole range of senior discounts.

Both my marker birthdays were pretty tame. When I turned 21, I was at a Jesuit seminary in Minnesota. I know I was sober because we seminarians had no access to liquor. Except for the Mass wine in the sacristy, alcohol was kept in a locked cabinet in the priests’ recreation room, and the nearest bar was a two-mile walk down the highway but none of us had any money to buy a drink even if we went there.

When I turned 65, I opened some very nice cards from a number of friends and relatives, and I had drinks and dinner with my Marquette Jesuit community. I also took time to write down three wishes I have for my future. Here they are.

First, I’d like to be like my dad, who stayed engaged with the people and things around him, and who read his medical journals until almost the day he died.

Second, I’d like to be like my mother, who, as she grew older, became more willing to say what she thought and felt — without giving offense but also without being apologetic.

Finally, and most importantly, when there are no more birthdays left for me, I hope that even though I know I will not have lived a perfect life by any stretch of the imagination, God will welcome me to eternity as a friend despite all my warts and shortcomings. And if that happens, what more could I wish for?