Pilgrimage to the Holy Land - day 10

31 December 2012 - New Year's Eve

Tomb - 
up at 4am and out by 4:30 with Thai and Nelson.  Morning prayer before the Tomb.  I am rushing and I feel it.  Need for more peaceful/recollected spirit.  Took time to pray and make my Mass offering at the altar of Mary Magdelene where Jesus appeared to her.

Mass in the Tomb.  Today I offered Mass for the Missionaries of Charity, and Msgr. Checchio and the NAC community.  Palowicz, Nelson, Rodgers, Kuharski, Bulso, and a nun came.  Here is my homily in full:

Do not be afraid of the silence of God.
Here in this empty Tomb, Jesus is not here.  The greatest monument to our faith is that He is not here.  We must not cling to this place, just like Mary Magdelene was told, but with a great act of faith realize that we now celebrate the Resurrection where the Resurrection happened.

Calvary - 
Fr. Gaffney - "Perhaps the greatest lesson Jesus taught us, an act of pure love".  It is not about what I get to do today but what You have done for me, what You are doing for me righ now.  Thank You.  Help us to receive/accept all that You pour out for us.

Stations - 
We went to the church of the Flagellation and began to pray the stations as we walked along the via dolorosa.  Just another place, but one I don't want to miss!  Real felt need to slow down and recollect.  Today is now all to ourselves - Thank You.  This must be what parents and families feel like, always rushing around and no time to think.  How to help them release in prayer, an opportunity for recollection, to notice Your presence in their life and enter into Your sacred mysteries and not just pass them by due to busyness of life.  Don't give up on grace, Peter didn't.

Gethsemane - 
crazy crowded with Italian pilgrims.  Tried to get into the cave where the apostles stayed but there was Mass going on there too.  Finally found a quiet place nearby where Mary was buried - she who always followed and trusted in the Lord, lead us to deeper union with Him!  As I began to read Mark my quiet place got crowded and noisy.  Jesus was always slipping off to Bethany, a quieter place with Lazarus, Mary and Martha - I understand why. Jerusalem is chaos.  Snuck back into the cave at Gethsemane for a moment of quiet with the Blessed Sacrament, but the sacristan and some people were yelling trying to communicate.  I helped translate, then it was quiet for a moment before another Mass came in and I had to leave.  Back to the garden of Gethsemane. 

I prayed for intentions here today, that all in their struggles might find consolation in Christ.  Asked for the grace of prayer.  No matter what I do or where I go I cannot find a quiet place to pray and reflect.  I am scattered and constantly interrupted, talked around, bumped, displaced.  Perhaps this is my lesson today:  to give up my schedule, to let my hopes and desires, my ministry be shaped by those around me.  These people are all pilgrims, though some are much more tourists, maybe here only once in their lives for 5 min.  I am fortunate enough to have the time and the desire to pray longer.  That is what life is like, people always around with different attitudes and dispositions, all needing You.  Do not let me be a deterrent to them by my attitude, do not let me make them into an obstacle in listening/seeing You.  Non mea sed Tua volunta.  Crush my pride and open my heart and mind to accept Your silence.  To be at peace with giving up my own way.  To focus on You, give my attention to You in the chaos of life's challenges, busyness and distractions.  To think of You, to think of others, not myself.  To love humility.  To be content in suffering.  To be in love with You.  

Prayer and love cannot be rushed.  In a moment they can flood the depths of your heart and enflame your soul, but they will not be pressed into a moment.  

Just as I was coming to grips with chaos, Gethsemane kicked me out.  I wander about and stumble into the Armenian church at the 3rd and 4th stations - a place devoted to silence.

Adoration - 
down below the main church is a crypt where they have perpetual adoration.  It is quiet and still.  Teach me to ponder the mysteries of our Lord; the mysteries I have encountered and celebrated today.  In the midst of the chaos of the carrying of the Cross Mary found Jesus and she looked at Him face to face.  For the space of a moment they encounter one another.  Now I have this same opportunity to see Jesus face to face.  O Jesus, let us encounter/discover Your love.

How you encountered people:  "Jesus, looking at him, loved him..." (Mark 9).  

Jesus came to Jerusalem to die.  He taught about a time of reckoning in Jerusalem, that we must give an account.  Judas betrayed; scribes, pharisees, herodians set up trecharies; Peter denied; the Twelve did not believe Mary Magdelene.  Finished Matthew and Mark.

Notre Dame - 
Began reading John.  Much different than Matthew and Mark.  "Come" "Believe".  The way Jesus interacts, He's always speaking about deeper things.  Speaks to the hidden hopes of their hearts.  Fr. Keith Romke shows up here, Fr. Craig Vasek too - what a grace to meet them here unexpectedly.  Fr. Lockey is here too (Illinois, Minnesota, and now Texas have shown up in the Holy Land.  Ridiculous).   To be interested in another, to make them feel wanted, to want to be around them.  This is what I encounter in these priests, this is what Jesus is doing in John.

Fr. Hurley - there is a temptation to pull back from prayer, from entering into prayer.  Especially meditate on the Empty Tomb.  Wrestle with what it would be like after Good Friday.  Temptations from the desert to temptations on the Cross - come down, save Yourself and us.  We are tempted to grasp for ourself or we are going to get screwed over.  Disciples wrestle with what they expect the Messiah to look like and what happens to Jesus.