JP II and Peter

I was thinking about what it may be like in heaven when John Paul the Second (or JP II as he is affectionately called) and Peter meet. It might go something like this.

Peter: Karol Wojtyla! JP II. Welcome to heaven!
JPII: Who are you?
Peter: Do not be afraid! (Both laugh at hearing Peter say John Paul's motto) I'm Peter, the rock on which the church is built.
JP II: (He begins to kneel out of respect)
Peter: No, don't do that. (Peter looks around embarrassed) Up here we pay respect to God alone since we can finally see him face to face.
JPII: (Nodding understandingly): I see
Peter: Hey, nice job carrying on my office. I appreciated the World Youth Days. In your time, the youth can be led astray by so many things so it was important to do whatever you could to combat that attitude. Oh, and the whole Polish Solidarity movement was beautiful. Single handedly taking down the mighty Soviet Union and allowing Reagan to think that he helped. Way to listen to the Holy Sprit!
JP II: She has always been a sure guide! And I always appreciated those letters you left for us that we incorporated into our scriptures. They were always reminders to me of the holiness of my office. Let me ask you now that I have you here, did you really write those letters?
Peter: What do you mean? Did I really write those letters! What are you suggesting?
JP II: Because some people said that you didn't. I just saying, they thought you didn't write them because of the understanding of the church in them and other things they thought pointed to a much later date of composition.
Peter: You're going to believe Raymond Brown over St. Jerome? (Peter said this while pointing over to a man who seemed to be passionately disagreeing with an angel holding a harp. JP II could hear the man say, "I'm just saying, Gabriel, psalm 15 is a much better psalm than psalm 105. I think we should sing it at the next praise session.")
JP II: I thought you wrote them, I was just checking. (JP II smiles embarrassed to have asked)
Peter: Oh, and one other thing and then we can live in peace for eternity. When they called you the most traveled Pope ever, did you ever suggest to the media that I may have traveled more than you?
JP II: Oh?
Peter: Yeah. I traveled from Jerusalem all the way to Spain and ended up in Rome. And that was without planes and busses and stuff and it was back when we thought the world was flat. I was terrified that I was going to fall off the edge for crying out loud.
JP II: Well, still Peter. I went all over the world. I even went to Iowa, which, might I add, Kevin Costner was right. Heaven does look a lot like Iowa!
Peter: I never thought of that before. (Peter looks around and the looks down toward earth) We even have pigs and corn and have all four seasons. But, getting back to traveling, I still think that you could have mentioned to at least one reporter that you thought I traveled more.
JP II: Well Peter, don't forget that I also learned all several languages and met with world leaders.
Peter: (looking irritated, which Peter is not used to feeling!)
JP II: Let's just say that I always felt like Paul was the better traveler between the two of you. You didn't even go east did you?
Peter: (Suddenly looking understanding) No, I guess not. Okay, whatever. I'm just saying that if I had a pope mobile with bullet proof glass that didn't smell like donkey I may have been more willing to travel.
JP II: (smiling) I have no doubt Peter.
Peter: In any case, well done good and faithful servant. Now take your place in the everlasting banquet of heaven. (Peter puts his arm around JP II and the two of them walk off towards the other people seated around a gigantic lavish table with God at the head...)

Okay, it might be nothing like that. But, don't you want to live you life so that you might be able to see it?

Encountering Teens Encountering Christ

I just spent the last three days with fifty seven high school seniors on retreat. There were undoubtedly a million other things that High School Seniors could have been doing other than hearing a group of adults talk about their relationship to Christ. But, that's what happened for me these last three days. I have a huge headache and I'm about three phonecalls behind but I'm filled with the Holy Spirit right now. I won't go into details but, for me, the best part of the weekend was watching the kids from different High Schools and different lives slowly be transformed into a trusting, cohesive group that care about one another. I love watching the kids that normally don't fit in being accepted because the seniors are far enough away from Middle School to start accepting people for who they are. I love when that kid that you don't think is going to get anything out of the weekend says something incredibly profound in a moment of prayer. I feel full of energy and exhausted at the same time.

Second Sunday In Easter

I’ve been thinking a lot about my grandma recently. Her married name was Helen Schott or “Shut” as it was often pronounced on this side of the state. I can’t imagine any of you meeting Helen Schott since she lived most of her adult life on a farm in Perry, Iowa. I myself didn’t get to know her very well but two of my greatest regrets happened with my grandmother. The first happened when she wanted to go see the movie Annie when I was in grade school. Since my snobbish brothers and sisters didn’t want to go. Grandma Helen had to go see Annie all alone. The second regret that I have with my grandma happened when I was supposed to go visit her in the nursing home as a teenager. But, in my defense, grandma had changed since she invited me to go see a movie. Grandma had gone from a cook, comforter and matron into a person that didn’t recognize her children or grandchildren when they came to visit. She stared into space and ground her teeth; the results of years of Alzheimer’s-like dementia taking away all the personality my grandma used to have. I just wanted her to die, to be at peace, and to not interfere with my beautiful life with ugliness. Grandma had become an…inconvenience.
We’ve probably all heard about doubting Thomas before. We read this story each second Sunday of Easter, after all. We hear Thomas doubt Jesus’ resurrection and, one week later, be invited by Jesus to probe his wounds if it will help his belief. We may have even asked ourselves why the gospels are so hard on Thomas considering Jesus comment last week to Mary Magdalene about letting go of Jesus so that he could go to the Father. Wasn’t Thomas just doing the very act that the tearful Mary Magdalene wasn’t able to do? What we may not have considered before is why Thomas wouldn’t have been excited about the prospect that Jesus is still alive. I think there’s a parallel with my own experience with my experience with my grandma. I imagine at the time of the resurrection there were times when a person appeared to have died who had, in fact, merely fallen into a coma or vegetative state. This same person may come out of these situations and appear to have been raised from the dead. But, the truth is that, in that context, the person was going to still have to die, probably in a slow painful way since the technology we have of feeding tubes and drugs wasn’t present as a source of comfort. Thomas may have feared, therefore, that Jesus would have a miserable existence and figured that he’d be better off dead.
This week we have all been forced to think about death. First, we heard about Terry Schiavo and, as the biased media portrayed it, her “right-to-die” situation. Then we heard about the illness and eventual death of the only Pope that people my age and younger have known. You may have questioned why the church came down so heavily on the side of the Schindlers who wanted to keep their daughter, Terry, alive but then John Paul the second didn’t even go to a hospital for advanced care towards the end of his life. Was the Pope being a hypocrite by not getting aggressive care while expecting ford and hydration for Terry Schiavo. Was the pope asking that Terry Schiavo participate in suffering that he himself shirked in the end. Hardly!
Being a Christian, indeed, being human means that life has value. We shouldn’t have to be productive or happy or good looking or intelligent to be worth something. We should just be able to exist and that should be all that matters. When we start to attach certain benchmarks to determine if life has quality to it, then life becomes meaningless. Life itself has value. And part of what we realize is that even death can be passing to new life if we die to ourselves and and our own convenience and let God be in control. In the mind of the church, therefore, basic nutrition and hydration should not be considered extraordinary. We give food and water to people because no one should have to starve to death.
As we continue to reflect on death the next few days of the Pope’s funeral, this pope that I believe would have been honored to die on Divine Mercy Sunday, let us always remember that even as inconvenient and unexpected death is, so will our resurrection be unexpected and grace filled.