Pastor’s Note
Braving the Wind - He Giveth More Grace
If you were at last Sunday’s drive-in Mass in the Boonton Plaza parking lot, you might recognize this image (thanks, Chuck Wildey).
When I posted the picture on Facebook, friends and fellow parishioners alike enjoyed the shot. My heading, “Not waiting until Pentecost” was taken in every possible direction. My thought was simply that God wasn’t holding the wind back that day, but others were thinking through the power of the Holy Spirit and required superhero attire: Do chasubles (the outer vestment I wear for Mass) count as capes? I don’t know whether or not there was a resolution to that discussion, but I know that you have all been very generous with me these past couple of months. I am thoroughly thankful for your support and encouragement.
Later on Facebook, I tried to broach a more serious topic. I aired some uncertainty about how quickly we’ll be able to bring back regular Masses. Needless to say, there are big challenges ahead of us. Getting back to normal - if that is our goal - will not be possible for some time, no matter how deeply we desire it.
For my part, I am convinced that we need to protect the most vulnerable among us. We are a pro-life people in every sense of the term, and we defend the dignity of every human being from the cradle to the grave and everything in between. I desperately want to have Mass in the church again, but I can’t get my head around the danger to the aged and infirm of doing so. Like so many of you I sometimes feel like I could die for Jesus, but we should be far less willing to kill for him.
As it stands, there’s no course for us to chart these days except to surrender to God in challenging conditions.
Before I close, let me share with you a poem that I sometimes recite at funerals. Given that we’re all likely in some stage of grief or other, I think the words of Annie Johnson Flint can give us courage and new strength in the face of adversity:
He Giveth More Grace
• He giveth more grace when the burdens grow greater,
He sendeth more strength when the labors increase;
To added afflictions He addeth His mercy,
To multiplied trials, His multiplied peace.
• When we have exhausted our store of endurance,
When our strength has failed ere the day is half done,
When we reach the end of our hoarded resources
Our Father’s full giving is only begun.
• Fear not that thy need shall exceed His provision,
Our God ever yearns His resources to share;
Lean hard on the arm everlasting, availing;
The Father both thee and thy load will upbear.
• His love has no limits, His grace has no measure,
His power no boundary known unto men;
For out of His infinite riches in Jesus
He giveth, and giveth, and giveth again.
In the Peace of the Risen Christ,
Father Daniel
δοῦλος Χριστοῦ Ἰησοῦ