17th Sunday in Ordinary time
Friends,
There is a photo going around on facebook. Perhaps you’ve seen it: at the top there is a family saying grace before dinner. The caption says, “Thanks, Jesus, for this food.” And at the bottom there is a photo of a Mexican farm worker out in the field, saying “De nada.” You’re welcome.
I don’t know any farm workers named Jesús, but I sure as heck know people who have been working up to 84 hours a week to put food on all of our tables. As we read again this week the story of the loaves and fishes that fed five thousand families, it’s a good moment to think about being co-creators with God. Our work, and the miracle of God’s creation: together, they feed the world.
Capo and I planted a garden in my back yard this Spring. He did about twenty times as much work as I did, and much neater, in the same amount of time. This past weekend we ate our first tomato. What a miracle it is, how one tiny seed becomes a plant, all that DNA doing its job of mapping out the directions to unfold a living creature, one molecule at a time; and fruit grows, and is ripened by the sun, and at last, we eat it.
Actually, something else had already taken the first bite! – which is a reminder that all this miraculous growth isn’t just for us. We share this world with a myriad of living creatures, and we have a responsibility to take care of it and treat it well.
It is troubling to wonder if the drought we are experiencing now has been brought on, or at least made worse, by human activity.
A lot of Biblical commentators believe that the miracle of the loaves and fishes was that people were inspired to share what they already had. I like that explanation, because inspiring us to share what we have is a miracle we need. We don’t need God to do magic. The world is full of magic already. We ought to be walking around with our jaws dropped in wonder. There is enough for everyone, and if the story of the feeding of the five thousand tells us anything, it’s that God wants us to have what we need – wants everybody to have what we need. We need to share our resources, and be aware that the world is not just for us. Every life is precious. North American life… Mexican life… Central and South American life… Indian life… Asian life… African life… European life. Plant life and animal life and ocean life. Birds and butterflies and even those gol-darn bugs. We need each other.
The miracle we need – besides the miracle of rain – is the miracle of each of us realizing that the lives of people everywhere are as precious as our own. We are all connected, every living thing. May we have the gift of awe. May we be unafraid to share. May our hands be open, and may all be fed.
Love and light to all
Chava
___________________________________________________
Oscar Romero Church
An Inclusive Community of Liberation, Justice and Joy
Worshiping in the Catholic Tradition
Mass: Sundays, 11
St Joseph's House of Hospitality, 402 South Ave, Rochester NY 14620
Tuesday, July 31, 2012
Bulletin for Sunday, July 22, 2012
16th Sunday in Ordinary time
Friends,
There are several lovely things to share with you this week.
First – you probably already know this – Bishop Clark turned 75 this week. I want to take this opportunity to say how grateful I am that he has been our bishop for the past several decades. He has taken courageous stands on issues that have touched all our lives. He has helped to make the world a better place. May God bless him with all good things.
This past weekend was the Pride Parade. Spiritus Christi, Immanuel Baptist, Mary Magdalene and St Romero’s walked together: four woman-led churches! There were other churches in the parade, as well. It is important that we be a presence there, because there is a lot of hating in the name of God going on, especially on Goodman St. I actually heard someone preaching, “Hate is in the Bible!” So it’s important that we bring God’s love and acceptance, God’s delight in all persons, to the Pride Parade each year.
More good news: this past Sunday at St Romero’s we had four new people. As usual, at about five minutes to eleven I was wondering if this was going to be the week nobody showed up, and then, tada! in came several people, including four newcomers. A woman came over from Southview Towers, a young man found us on the internet, and two more women heard of us at St Joe’s. Hooray!
All is well at Iglesia de San Romero, as well. This week it was raining as we began the Mass, so we moved it to the bodega, aka the barn, which worked really well. We’ve had some new folks there, too. I’m happy to tell you that on the day it was so terribly hot this week, at least one crew was told it was too hot to work and to take the day off. Please pray for everybody working in the fields this time of year. Imagine planting cabbage or picking cucumbers for 12 or 14 hours a day in this weather. It boggles the mind, and yet is the reality of our friends.
And finally, a check came in the mail this week: a tithing check from Spiritus Christi. Thank you, Spiritus, for remembering us, your little sister church! The moral support means at least as much as the money.
Here is a story in closing. One of “my” floors at the nursing home had its summer picnic this week. It was lovely to spend time relaxing with the elders. There was one woman I didn’t recognize. I went over to introduce myself. She told me, apologetically, that she wasn’t from that floor! And said, in a conspiratorial whisper, “I’m crashing the party!”
May each of us have the spunk to crash a party when we’re pushing 90.
Stay cool. I will share with you our family motto: Ice cream is always a good idea.
Love and light to all
Chava
____________________________________________________
Oscar Romero Church
An Inclusive Community of Liberation, Justice and Joy
Worshiping in the Catholic Tradition
Mass: Sundays, 11
St Joseph's House of Hospitality, 402 South Ave, Rochester NY 14620
Friends,
There are several lovely things to share with you this week.
First – you probably already know this – Bishop Clark turned 75 this week. I want to take this opportunity to say how grateful I am that he has been our bishop for the past several decades. He has taken courageous stands on issues that have touched all our lives. He has helped to make the world a better place. May God bless him with all good things.
This past weekend was the Pride Parade. Spiritus Christi, Immanuel Baptist, Mary Magdalene and St Romero’s walked together: four woman-led churches! There were other churches in the parade, as well. It is important that we be a presence there, because there is a lot of hating in the name of God going on, especially on Goodman St. I actually heard someone preaching, “Hate is in the Bible!” So it’s important that we bring God’s love and acceptance, God’s delight in all persons, to the Pride Parade each year.
More good news: this past Sunday at St Romero’s we had four new people. As usual, at about five minutes to eleven I was wondering if this was going to be the week nobody showed up, and then, tada! in came several people, including four newcomers. A woman came over from Southview Towers, a young man found us on the internet, and two more women heard of us at St Joe’s. Hooray!
All is well at Iglesia de San Romero, as well. This week it was raining as we began the Mass, so we moved it to the bodega, aka the barn, which worked really well. We’ve had some new folks there, too. I’m happy to tell you that on the day it was so terribly hot this week, at least one crew was told it was too hot to work and to take the day off. Please pray for everybody working in the fields this time of year. Imagine planting cabbage or picking cucumbers for 12 or 14 hours a day in this weather. It boggles the mind, and yet is the reality of our friends.
And finally, a check came in the mail this week: a tithing check from Spiritus Christi. Thank you, Spiritus, for remembering us, your little sister church! The moral support means at least as much as the money.
Here is a story in closing. One of “my” floors at the nursing home had its summer picnic this week. It was lovely to spend time relaxing with the elders. There was one woman I didn’t recognize. I went over to introduce myself. She told me, apologetically, that she wasn’t from that floor! And said, in a conspiratorial whisper, “I’m crashing the party!”
May each of us have the spunk to crash a party when we’re pushing 90.
Stay cool. I will share with you our family motto: Ice cream is always a good idea.
Love and light to all
Chava
____________________________________________________
Oscar Romero Church
An Inclusive Community of Liberation, Justice and Joy
Worshiping in the Catholic Tradition
Mass: Sundays, 11
St Joseph's House of Hospitality, 402 South Ave, Rochester NY 14620
Bulletin for Sunday, July 15, 2012
15th Sunday in Ordinary time
Friends,
What a joy it was, a week ago, to tell our Mexican community about Librada Paz winning the Robert F Kennedy Foundation’s Human Rights Award. Librada was there, with her baby son, Axel, and her parents who were visiting from Mexico. I showed them the newspaper article and said, “Nuestra Librada es famosa!” Our Librada is famous!
The best thing, though, was telling them that at the same time as the great honor for Librada, the RFK Foundation is sending a message about them: their value, the value of their lives and of the work they do. What a beautiful thing it was to be able to say that to people who suffer in the ways that they do: You are not forgotten. There was a young man who was not able to be at Mass on Thursday. I saw him on Friday night and explained it to him. He listened, and as he understood what I was saying, a beautiful smile crossed his face.
The award does have teeth in it. It’s not just “Yay, wonderful you, hooray” --- there is a six year commitment to aid in getting a comprehensive farmworker rights bill passed in Albany, that comes with it.
I do not like to talk about my own experience of poverty. The stigma is so great that I can still feel it, today. I remember sitting in my caseworker’s office, waiting for something or other, and fiercely reminding myself of all that was good and strong and beautiful in my life – my kids, especially. The hardest thing about being down in the muck is feeling that all you deserve is muck. How much harder is it for people in their position? How hard is it to believe you are a person of worth and dignity?
That’s a big part of our job as church: to help each other see our worth and dignity, to see what’s best in each other, to believe in possibility. To give hope and vision when it seems impossible to hope or to see a better future.
Another part of our job as church is to work to make that better future possible. Librada’s RFK award is cause for celebration, not just because we’re so proud of her, but because it gives us hope that that better future might, indeed, be possible. May it be so.
This coming Saturday is the Rochester Pride Parade! We’ll be marching with Mary Magdalene Church. Meet at the corner of Park and Brunswick at 3 pm if you’d like to march, too!
And as always, come join us any Sunday at 11 at St Joe’s, or any Thursday, leaving St Joe’s at 6:30, coming home about 10:30.
Love and light to all
Chava
Here’s a quote from a great movie:
“Accepting our powerlessness and our extreme poverty, is an invitation, an urgent appeal to create with others relationships not based on power.
Recognizing my weaknesses, I accept those of others. I can bear them, make them mine, in imitation of Christ. Such an attitude transforms us for our mission.
Weakness in itself is not a virtue, but the expression of a fundamental reality which must constantly be refashioned by faith, hope and love.
The apostle’s weakness is like Christ’s, rooted in the mystery of Easter, and the strength of the spirit.
It is neither passivity nor resignation. It requires great courage and incites one to defend justice and truth and to denounce the temptation of force and power.”
- “Of Gods and Men”
___________________________________________________
Oscar Romero Church
An Inclusive Community of Liberation, Justice and Joy
Worshiping in the Catholic Tradition
Mass: Sundays, 11
St Joseph's House of Hospitality, 402 South Ave, Rochester NY 14620
Friends,
What a joy it was, a week ago, to tell our Mexican community about Librada Paz winning the Robert F Kennedy Foundation’s Human Rights Award. Librada was there, with her baby son, Axel, and her parents who were visiting from Mexico. I showed them the newspaper article and said, “Nuestra Librada es famosa!” Our Librada is famous!
The best thing, though, was telling them that at the same time as the great honor for Librada, the RFK Foundation is sending a message about them: their value, the value of their lives and of the work they do. What a beautiful thing it was to be able to say that to people who suffer in the ways that they do: You are not forgotten. There was a young man who was not able to be at Mass on Thursday. I saw him on Friday night and explained it to him. He listened, and as he understood what I was saying, a beautiful smile crossed his face.
The award does have teeth in it. It’s not just “Yay, wonderful you, hooray” --- there is a six year commitment to aid in getting a comprehensive farmworker rights bill passed in Albany, that comes with it.
I do not like to talk about my own experience of poverty. The stigma is so great that I can still feel it, today. I remember sitting in my caseworker’s office, waiting for something or other, and fiercely reminding myself of all that was good and strong and beautiful in my life – my kids, especially. The hardest thing about being down in the muck is feeling that all you deserve is muck. How much harder is it for people in their position? How hard is it to believe you are a person of worth and dignity?
That’s a big part of our job as church: to help each other see our worth and dignity, to see what’s best in each other, to believe in possibility. To give hope and vision when it seems impossible to hope or to see a better future.
Another part of our job as church is to work to make that better future possible. Librada’s RFK award is cause for celebration, not just because we’re so proud of her, but because it gives us hope that that better future might, indeed, be possible. May it be so.
This coming Saturday is the Rochester Pride Parade! We’ll be marching with Mary Magdalene Church. Meet at the corner of Park and Brunswick at 3 pm if you’d like to march, too!
And as always, come join us any Sunday at 11 at St Joe’s, or any Thursday, leaving St Joe’s at 6:30, coming home about 10:30.
Love and light to all
Chava
Here’s a quote from a great movie:
“Accepting our powerlessness and our extreme poverty, is an invitation, an urgent appeal to create with others relationships not based on power.
Recognizing my weaknesses, I accept those of others. I can bear them, make them mine, in imitation of Christ. Such an attitude transforms us for our mission.
Weakness in itself is not a virtue, but the expression of a fundamental reality which must constantly be refashioned by faith, hope and love.
The apostle’s weakness is like Christ’s, rooted in the mystery of Easter, and the strength of the spirit.
It is neither passivity nor resignation. It requires great courage and incites one to defend justice and truth and to denounce the temptation of force and power.”
- “Of Gods and Men”
___________________________________________________
Oscar Romero Church
An Inclusive Community of Liberation, Justice and Joy
Worshiping in the Catholic Tradition
Mass: Sundays, 11
St Joseph's House of Hospitality, 402 South Ave, Rochester NY 14620
Bulletin for Sunday, July 8, 2012
14th Sunday in Ordinary time
Friends,
Back in 2008 or 9, Spiritus Christi sponsored an evening on Immigration Reform. Marilu Aguilar organized it, and brought in some great speakers, including Wally Ruehle. Among the speakers that night was a young woman named Librada Paz. I remember her talk better than any of the others (sorry, Wally!) because she spoke from her own experience, having come here undocumented as a teenager from Mexico. I particularly remember her story of needing to go to the hospital and being afraid to go because of the risk of getting turned in to immigration.
Our paths crossed again in October, 2010, when she and I were both part of a group from the Presbytery of Genesee Valley and Rural and Migrant Ministries that toured some fields and met some farmworkers. It was that night that the dream of coming back to offer Mass in Spanish was born. If Librada hadn’t given me her email address and said to contact her in the Spring, our little Migrant church would not have happened. The following June, she and I spent an evening driving around Elba and Clarendon, meeting people and asking if they would like a Mass, until finally we were invited to come and celebrate at the location where we now meet weekly.
My Spanish was good enough to preach and celebrate the Mass, at that point. I depended on Librada for all other communication. She still helps with translation, now, when I get stuck. (which still happens a lot!)
In September when two of our guys were taken by la migra, she and I worked together to find where they were, and together visited Santiago when he was in detention. She was the person I called for directions when I went to get them out, because I didn’t know my way around Batavia, and she came to Mass to celebrate their return that week. She even videotaped the guys talking about their experience, to document it for Rural and Migrant Ministries. She has been tireless in walking with us, even through her pregnancy, and now she has brought her beautiful baby son, Axel, to our Thursday Mass.
Iglesia de San Romero would not exist without Librada’s help, all along the way.
So, it is with great joy that I tell you that Librada Paz has been named the recipient of the Robert F. Kennedy Foundation’s Award for Human Rights, this year, for her work with farm workers.
Congratulations, Librada. What a wonderful, wonderful thing! Gracias por todos tu trabajar por nuestra hermanos y hermanos quien trabajan tan duro en los campos. Dios te bendiga, siempre! Thank you for all your work for our brothers and sisters who work so hard in the fields. God bless you, always!
Love and light to all
Chava
Here’s a link to an article in the New York Daily News:
http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/amazing-journey-librada-paz-u-s-scary-desert-trek-degree-citizenship-wins-rfk-award-aiding-farm-workers-article-1.1107498?localLinksEnabled=false
...and a photo of Librada and baby Axel is attached
___________________________________________________
Oscar Romero Church
An Inclusive Community of Liberation, Justice and Joy
Worshiping in the Catholic Tradition
Mass: Sundays, 11
St Joseph's House of Hospitality, 402 South Ave, Rochester NY 14620
Friends,
Back in 2008 or 9, Spiritus Christi sponsored an evening on Immigration Reform. Marilu Aguilar organized it, and brought in some great speakers, including Wally Ruehle. Among the speakers that night was a young woman named Librada Paz. I remember her talk better than any of the others (sorry, Wally!) because she spoke from her own experience, having come here undocumented as a teenager from Mexico. I particularly remember her story of needing to go to the hospital and being afraid to go because of the risk of getting turned in to immigration.
Our paths crossed again in October, 2010, when she and I were both part of a group from the Presbytery of Genesee Valley and Rural and Migrant Ministries that toured some fields and met some farmworkers. It was that night that the dream of coming back to offer Mass in Spanish was born. If Librada hadn’t given me her email address and said to contact her in the Spring, our little Migrant church would not have happened. The following June, she and I spent an evening driving around Elba and Clarendon, meeting people and asking if they would like a Mass, until finally we were invited to come and celebrate at the location where we now meet weekly.
My Spanish was good enough to preach and celebrate the Mass, at that point. I depended on Librada for all other communication. She still helps with translation, now, when I get stuck. (which still happens a lot!)
In September when two of our guys were taken by la migra, she and I worked together to find where they were, and together visited Santiago when he was in detention. She was the person I called for directions when I went to get them out, because I didn’t know my way around Batavia, and she came to Mass to celebrate their return that week. She even videotaped the guys talking about their experience, to document it for Rural and Migrant Ministries. She has been tireless in walking with us, even through her pregnancy, and now she has brought her beautiful baby son, Axel, to our Thursday Mass.
Iglesia de San Romero would not exist without Librada’s help, all along the way.
So, it is with great joy that I tell you that Librada Paz has been named the recipient of the Robert F. Kennedy Foundation’s Award for Human Rights, this year, for her work with farm workers.
Congratulations, Librada. What a wonderful, wonderful thing! Gracias por todos tu trabajar por nuestra hermanos y hermanos quien trabajan tan duro en los campos. Dios te bendiga, siempre! Thank you for all your work for our brothers and sisters who work so hard in the fields. God bless you, always!
Love and light to all
Chava
Here’s a link to an article in the New York Daily News:
http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/amazing-journey-librada-paz-u-s-scary-desert-trek-degree-citizenship-wins-rfk-award-aiding-farm-workers-article-1.1107498?localLinksEnabled=false
...and a photo of Librada and baby Axel is attached
___________________________________________________
Oscar Romero Church
An Inclusive Community of Liberation, Justice and Joy
Worshiping in the Catholic Tradition
Mass: Sundays, 11
St Joseph's House of Hospitality, 402 South Ave, Rochester NY 14620
Bulletin for Sunday, July 1, 2012
Thirteenth week in ordinary time
Friends,
Here’s a quote from Brazilian theologian Leonardo Boff:
"To adopt the place of the poor is our first deed of solidarity with them. This act is accomplished by making an effort to view reality from their perspective. And when we view reality from their perspective, that reality simply must be transformed."
I turned to Boff this week, looking for help in knowing how to pastor this little group of people whose lives are so heavy with injustice, poverty, work and seemingly intractable problems.
As I preached at Iglesia de San Romero this past week, a sermon I preached at the nursing home and on Sunday at St Romero’s, as well, I watched the faces of the people listening. A preacher can often tell when what they’re saying is hitting home. Eyes light up, heads nod. I love it when that happens. Well, it wasn’t happening this time! My message could be summed up as, “you are special, unique and precious just as you are” and I got the feeling it just wasn’t feeding them. One man sat slumped against the side of a car, the weight of his life almost visible on his shoulders. After Mass he kindly thanked me for coming. My presence – our presence – is worth something just as it is. It’s a sign of hope, proof that they are not absolutely forgotten.
But I was discontented and found myself carrying the question: how does one minister to people in this impossible situation? Our experience of church needs to be more than just frosting in their lives. It needs to be bread for the journey.
So I turned to Leonardo Boff. His book, “When Theology Listens to the Poor,” has a chapter entitled “How Ought We to Celebrate the Eucharist in a World of Injustice?” How do we make the celebration of the Mass itself an act of justice? In that chapter I found this: “true worship of God is realized... in the building of a community of sisters and brothers”
Ultimately it occurred to me that perhaps the way to serve this community is the way one builds any community. Show up! Bring your weakness as well as your strength. Laugh together. Forgive. Hang in there. Act justly, love tenderly, walk humbly with your God... and keep working on your Spanish.
Yesterday in Buffalo I found another answer to that question. The guys are in yet another difficult situation, with the government demanding one thing and their boss demanding another. I introduced the guys to the English expression, “between a rock and a hard place.” As we worked to find a solution, I said to the man, “Do you see their predicament?” and he nodded. He is bound by the rules he is upholding, but in that moment I detected a spark of sympathy.
It seems to me that moments like that are as much an experience of church as what we do around the altar. But they would not happen if we were not also gathered around the altar. The food for the soul we receive at Mass is also an invisible thread of caring - a bit of gluten! – that stretches and binds us together. Yeast, we are. Little, hidden – and life-giving. May it be so, may it be so.
Love and light to all
Chava
Please join us, any time you like: Sundays at 11 in the city, Thursdays at 8 in the country, leaving St Joe’s at 6:30. Donations of cookies for our social time after Mass are welcome, but what we’d like most is you!
___________________________________________________
Oscar Romero Church
An Inclusive Community of Liberation, Justice and Joy
Worshiping in the Catholic Tradition
Mass: Sundays, 11
St Joseph's House of Hospitality, 402 South Ave, Rochester NY 14620
Friends,
Here’s a quote from Brazilian theologian Leonardo Boff:
"To adopt the place of the poor is our first deed of solidarity with them. This act is accomplished by making an effort to view reality from their perspective. And when we view reality from their perspective, that reality simply must be transformed."
I turned to Boff this week, looking for help in knowing how to pastor this little group of people whose lives are so heavy with injustice, poverty, work and seemingly intractable problems.
As I preached at Iglesia de San Romero this past week, a sermon I preached at the nursing home and on Sunday at St Romero’s, as well, I watched the faces of the people listening. A preacher can often tell when what they’re saying is hitting home. Eyes light up, heads nod. I love it when that happens. Well, it wasn’t happening this time! My message could be summed up as, “you are special, unique and precious just as you are” and I got the feeling it just wasn’t feeding them. One man sat slumped against the side of a car, the weight of his life almost visible on his shoulders. After Mass he kindly thanked me for coming. My presence – our presence – is worth something just as it is. It’s a sign of hope, proof that they are not absolutely forgotten.
But I was discontented and found myself carrying the question: how does one minister to people in this impossible situation? Our experience of church needs to be more than just frosting in their lives. It needs to be bread for the journey.
So I turned to Leonardo Boff. His book, “When Theology Listens to the Poor,” has a chapter entitled “How Ought We to Celebrate the Eucharist in a World of Injustice?” How do we make the celebration of the Mass itself an act of justice? In that chapter I found this: “true worship of God is realized... in the building of a community of sisters and brothers”
Ultimately it occurred to me that perhaps the way to serve this community is the way one builds any community. Show up! Bring your weakness as well as your strength. Laugh together. Forgive. Hang in there. Act justly, love tenderly, walk humbly with your God... and keep working on your Spanish.
Yesterday in Buffalo I found another answer to that question. The guys are in yet another difficult situation, with the government demanding one thing and their boss demanding another. I introduced the guys to the English expression, “between a rock and a hard place.” As we worked to find a solution, I said to the man, “Do you see their predicament?” and he nodded. He is bound by the rules he is upholding, but in that moment I detected a spark of sympathy.
It seems to me that moments like that are as much an experience of church as what we do around the altar. But they would not happen if we were not also gathered around the altar. The food for the soul we receive at Mass is also an invisible thread of caring - a bit of gluten! – that stretches and binds us together. Yeast, we are. Little, hidden – and life-giving. May it be so, may it be so.
Love and light to all
Chava
Please join us, any time you like: Sundays at 11 in the city, Thursdays at 8 in the country, leaving St Joe’s at 6:30. Donations of cookies for our social time after Mass are welcome, but what we’d like most is you!
___________________________________________________
Oscar Romero Church
An Inclusive Community of Liberation, Justice and Joy
Worshiping in the Catholic Tradition
Mass: Sundays, 11
St Joseph's House of Hospitality, 402 South Ave, Rochester NY 14620
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